Active Communities Arts Development: Social Prescribing, Sustainable Strategic Planning And Breaking Down Barriers Across Sectors In North Lanarkshire

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North Lanarkshire's (NL) ambitious aim for regeneration includes reshaping and repopulating its town centres as places of creativity and enterprise to support economic growth. This involves developing a sense of place by protecting or redeveloping vacant priority buildings, and providing 'Super Hubs' to support integrated delivery of public services including lifelong learning, housing, third sector & adult care facilities, police & community safety initiatives, business & employment.The high-level strategic plan for NL highlights shared priorities across sectors, focusing on aspects of the human condition to significantly improve the quality of life & wellbeing of people who want to live, learn, work, invest in and visit the locality. The arts and humanities, however, are absent from this vision. While Covid-19 has emphasised the need for accessible arts provision across NL, particularly for marginalised groups, there is no formal arts strategy. This is concerning as NL has the 4th largest population of Scotland's 32 authorities & the Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation reports increases in deprivation. This collaboration builds on existing research - the Measuring Humanity research programme 'measuring' health and inequalities through creativity and connectivity - at the University of Edinburgh (UoE) - to: -co-produce a long-term, sustainable and 'measurable' Arts/Creative Communities strategic plan for NL with community members, including marginalised groups, and key stakeholders in health, education, business & employability, social justice & community safety that is integrated and aligned with other sectors' priorities-connect NL's departments, schools and grassroots organisations to ensure sustained access to the arts from early years through to healthy ageing-implement a social prescribing model to support the health & wellbeing of NL communities through the arts and humanities-identify assets (building, cultural, human resources, communities' knowledge & aspirations) that will contribute to a sustainable regeneration plan devised with constituents -implement a dignity and access fund for lower income households or those facing barriers in accessing the arts-develop a co-produced, multi-sectoral template for other local authorities' Arts/Creative Communities departments to apply/adapt/feed into national policies in Scotland & EnglandThe UoE will work with key national, regional and local partners (Scottish Communities Safety Network, Youth Theatre Arts Scotland; NL Enterprise & Communities; Community Learning & Development; NL Head of Education; NL Education & Families Social Work Service; NHS Lanarkshire and the Tron Theatre). We will apply the Measuring Humanity framework in various settings using participatory and arts-informed initiatives to connect with marginalised groups/other community members/partners across the lifespan:-early years education: Creative Consultation; Arts Pop Ups; Future Fridays & Primary Pathways in Schools -healthy aging: interactive 'Silent Disco' workshops with adults in care homes/living with dementia-community safety/social justice: musicBox to gather experiences of community safety and empower communities to capture stories using meaningful creative, community-based tools-creative consortiums: implement a mapping exercise of creative assets in NL to connect partners and create sustainable employment, education and improved quality of life opportunities linked to a social prescribing pathwayCommunity members will create an interactive, non-digital map (treasure trail) to show people how to get to arts venues; showcase various art-forms; and identify local, cultural assets. We will also pilot an Immersive Taxi Theatre Experiment for marginalised groups, cut off from transport links. The trips will get them to/from arts activities, while capturing meaningful stories about life experiences and turn them into creative podcasts