By Kevin MillikenFounder and Director

“Vision without Action is just a dream, Action without vision just passes the time and vision with Action can change the world”

Nelson Mandela

What is The One Initiative – Making Changes Project

The One Initiative – Making Changes Project is a newly developed project that will take the lead on the Food Bank Food Rush Project and The One Initiative Programmes, which are both currently operating across Renfrewshire. The Project will set its foundations as a new project different from all others currently running because it takes in the highly successful Food Bank Food Rush Project and the newly developed programmes of the One Initiative which include the One Renfrewshire – Making Changes Programme. The project will embrace working as One and Making Changes together to tackle poverty.

The new project became effective from January 2017 and has only made small changes to the Food Bank Food Rush Project and the One Initiative Programmes which will help them become more efficient in operation. The changes that have been made to the Food Bank Food Rush Project are in the Planning, Logistics and collections which will help make the project run more smoothly with collection dates planned 3 months before the collection and final arrangements being confirmed 3 weeks before collection. The changes to the One Initiative Programmes will be that research will not be gathered anymore from each individual area that the programme is working in, all information from an area will be gathered as one, which will make it more efficient and sustainable and help the programme move at a faster pace for the programme to move to the next stage.

The One Initiative – Making Changes Project will strive on making changes and sets 2017 the year of progress, where changes will be constructed and put together and then proposed onwards for changes to be made. The project also has an aim to grow the Food Bank Food Rush Project partnerships out with Renfrewshire and launch into other areas.

Developed from The Food Bank Food Rush Project and One Initiative Programmes there was a need for a new project to lead on both and that’s where the creation of The One Initiative – Making Changes Project came from; its foundations are set to strive for making changes in this year of progress. This project will be able to go to the next step as it has been created from two well established project and programme and can now lead tackling poverty onwards while supporting the project and programme.

Develop, Plan, Propose, Making Changes and doing it as One

How the One Initiative Programmes and The Food Bank Food Rush Project came together to create The One Initiative – Making

Changes Project

The One Initiative – Making Changes Project has been created from bringing The Food Bank Food Rush Project and the One Initiative Programmes under one structure and enable the projects and programmes to deliver better. The One Initiative Programmes will work under the direction of The One Initiative – Making Changes Project and the programmes will lead on the different One Initiative Programmes such as the One Renfrewshire – Making Changes programme. The One Initiatives Programmes will be key work to making changes and will also work closely with The Food Bank Food Rush Project and its partnerships. While the Food Bank Food Rush Project will continue food fundraising through the many collections that run each year as well expanding the network of partnerships and increasing the amount of food collected each year.

The Food Bank Food Rush Project and the One Initiative Programmes will come together in the way that they operate, they may not work together all the time because they are separate in their own way even as being part of The One Initiative – Making Changes Project. One Renfrewshire – Making Changes which is a programme of the One Initiative Programme can work with The Food Bank Food Rush Project school partners and is currently working with some in the current role out of the Making Changes idea box which sits in the main area of the school and the young people can submit ideas on what changes they would like to see in Renfrewshire in the 8 different categories that make the One Renfrewshire – Making Changes.

The One Initiative Programmes comes from The One Initiative – Making Changes Project, the programmes for example One Renfrewshire – Making Changes will carry out the work in each area currently Renfrewshire and will gather research and plan areas that change is required and could be made in. They are programmes because they may not always exist and if they were projects every time The One Initiative – Making Changes Project expanded into other areas it would get confusing and there would be all these different projects and that would not be effective in making changes and tackling poverty.

Working as One, delivering effective operations and Making Changes together

The Food Bank Food Rush Project is a food fundraising project currently operating across Renfrewshire. It currently has 25 partnerships ranging from schools, businesses and the Local Authority and over the last 3 years it has raised over 60,000 items of food. 2017 is set to be the biggest year on record as we set to increase school’s partners from 21 to 30 and businesses from 2 to 5.

The Project launched in April 2014 and between September and October 2014 all 11 secondary schools in Renfrewshire took part by having a non-uniform day and bringing in items of food for wearing their own clothes and this raised over 15,000 items of food. I expanded the project in 2015 and took on 9 Primary Schools as partners and the Local Authority who held a collection in August 2015. The 2015 collection raised over 20,000 items of food and this was helped with the new partnerships that were added, in the same year we also took on our first private company Doosan Babcock as a partnership who have been helping with the operations of the Food Bank Food Rush Project. The Project raised over 25,000 items of food in our 2016 collections which made it the most successful collection to date, this was due to our secondary school’s partners who collected more than they had in previous years with some big schools increasing their amounts by x3 the number of students they had, this helped to bring in just under 20,000 items of food from secondary schools alone with the rest of the donations coming from Primary Schools collections.

In late 2016 Intu Braehead/ Intu Braehead Soar became a partnership and will be doing their staff collection in early 2017 and we look forward to working with them in further developments under The One Initiative – Making Changes Project.

The Food Bank Food Rush Project will continue to expand in Renfrewshire and out with and can do this more effective now that we are part of The One Initiative – Making Changes Project. As the new project expands into other areas as it delivers its mission of making changes and doing it together as one, the Food Bank Food Rush Project will continue to reach out and help other food banks in other areas that need help and support and work with schools and businesses in doing this together.

“What you no longer need or want, someone else will need”

The One Initiative Programmes will lead on the One Initiatives which are set by The One Initiative – Making Changes Project. They are built around 8 different categories that are the core foundations of the One Initiative Programmes. The 8 different categories are powerful in today’s world as you can get a lot of change from them if you set a goal and work towards it and by using it the correct way. These 8 categories will sink the foundations firmly into the ground for changes to be made and poverty to be tackled together and as One. The 8 different categories that make the One Initiative Programme are:

Food Poverty Homeless People

Housing Economy

Education Areas

Population Unemployment

Each area that the programmes work in will have the same categories they will not change because if each area has different categories the project won’t work and changes won’t be made or effective. The 8 different categories above effect all areas, they may not have problems in all but each area has its differences.

The One Initiative Programmes under the direction of The One Initiative – Making Changes Project will work closely with schools to get young people involved because it is key that they become involved in tackling poverty of all kinds from the early stages due to the complexity of the word “Poverty” learning about the many things that can cause poverty and why. Social backgrounds, Areas, Population, Economy, Education, housing, these are all areas that need reforms and by having them part of the One Initiative Programmes through The One Initiative – Making Changes Project we can make the changes together.

The One Initiative – Making Changes Project will be expanding into other areas during 2017 year of progress and the One Initiative Programmes and The Food Bank Food Rush Project will be part of this expansion with many new partnerships set to be created with schools and businesses. This means that new programmes will be made as part of The One Initiative Programmes.

Tackling Poverty through changing the way society works doing this as One and Making Changes Together

The One Initiative – Making Changes Project Structure

The One Initiative - Making Changes Project

The Food Bank Food Rush Project

The One Initiative Programmes

Partnerships

Schools Businesses Local Authority

Community

Resources/ Fundraisers

Food Banks

Working as One and Making Changes Together

Supplying Food Banks through your Generous Donations

Our Aims

To strive for unity in tackling poverty

To work together is making sustainable changes for the benefit of everyone

To reach out and help as many food banks to meet today’s demand of food poverty

To engage all kinds of people from different backgrounds

To work through partners, schools, businesses and the Local Authority to bring changes to our communities

To work as One and tackle poverty of all kinds in society

To educate young people from a very young age of what “poverty” is and what the word means

To help lead the way in tackling poverty and to set an example for others to follow

To use the resources that an area has, to enable and help us make change and to develop new ways of working so nobody

is left out

Setting out a vision, a vision where everyone can act together as One Nation

How is the One Initiative – Making Changes Project being implemented in Renfrewshire

The One Initiative – Making Changes Project has already been implemented in Renfrewshire and has been since 2014 when the Food Bank Food Rush Project was launched. The Food Bank Food Rush Project has played a big part in helping the Renfrewshire food bank tackle food poverty by supplying it with donations through a range of schools, businesses and the local authority as partners.

Each year the project has grown but as of January 2017, The One Initiative – Making Changes Project will take the lead on The Food Bank Food Rush Project which will help make the project efficient and better operational, with changes being made in the Planning and Logistics in holding collections throughout the year.

2017 will see another expansion phase where we will increase our collection partners from 24 to 30 or more. This will be within businesses and Primary Schools throughout Renfrewshire as we aim to get more people, more citizens in Renfrewshire involved in The One Initiative – Making Changes Project and to work as One and to do it together in tackling all kinds of poverty here in Renfrewshire.

In June 2016 I launched a new programme called One Renfrewshire – Making Changes which will now fall under The One Initiative – Making Changes Project in One Initiative Programmes. There are 8 different categories that make the programme and they will be used in the making changes proposals and planning, they will never change and can fit around any area that the programme operates. A change can come from one category or can come from a group of categories working as a partnership with each other. The One Initiative Programmes will operate the making changes side of the operation of The One Initiative – Making Changes Programme.

The One Initiative Programmes which will run One Renfrewshire – Making Changes Programme is currently in the developing stages and will be set for a relaunch later in 2017. The relaunch is part of the new restructure the project as went under to create the newly developed project.

Although the project has already been implemented in Renfrewshire small changes have had to be made to make the project successful and to achieve its aim as working as One and Making Changes Together. The One Initiative – Making Changes Project sets its foundations as a new project but will take a firm lead on the current Food Bank Food Rush Project and The One Initiative Programmes with one being highly successful and one being in the developing stages of bring changes to Renfrewshire.

The structure has been adapted to bring the project as one and the aims of the Food Bank Food Rush Project has been brought together with the aims of One Initiative Programmes aims to create aims of The One Initiative – Making Changes Project.

The changes to the Food Bank Food Rush Project under The One Initiative – Making Changes project are all collections will now be arranged at least 3 months in advanced. This will help the food bank on collection dates and to see if their van is available on the day’s collections are being held. In the planning of Secondary Schools collections there will now be a maximum of 3 schools per day due to the size of the donations that come in from secondary schools. There will be a maximum of 4 Primary Schools holding their collection on the one day, but as there are so many their collections will run over a few weeks.

Collections will usually take place on a Friday with some schools opting to hold a week-long collection. For the young people and staff to bring in donations of food they get to have a non-uniform day or casual day. Each school embrace this as a challenge to raise as many donations as possible because they understand where it will be going and what it will be used for.

To Implement and proceed with Making Changes in our continued partnership with the Local Authority

The Founder and Director

Who am I and what inspired me to set all this up

My name is Kevin Milliken and I am the Founder and Director of The One Initiative – Making Changes Project. The project as you know started way back in 2014 and was known as Food Bank Food Rush. It was a food fundraising campaign when I launched it, I never really had a vision at that point to where it may end up, it was really a trial year to see how successful it would be and over September and October 2014 it paid off when all 11 secondary schools took part and raised over 15,000 items of food for the Renfrewshire food bank.

I believe things happen for a reason and that one evening in March I watched a channel 5 documentaries – Famous, Rich and Hungry, a programme about celebrities that live with families and single parents for a few days to see the real struggles that society really faces. I never really knew what a food bank was until after I had watched the first episode of this programme that I started to do research to see if there were food banks in Renfrewshire. I was shocked that there was because I had never known any to exist, we always think that things happen in other communities but not our own but I was wrong, Renfrewshire turned out to be the 3 rd

busiest food bank in Scotland.

Two months after I launched the project June 2014, I went on a charity trip to Bangalore, India for 2 weeks to work with a charity that educates children and young people from the very young ages right through to the ages of 27 – 28 because mainstream schools don’t accept them due to their disability and because they are from poor family backgrounds.

My 2-week visit gave me memories and experiences to never forget, it showed me the everyday reality of people living in a 3rd world country and the struggles they face in everyday life, the struggles of money and feeding their family and children. I saw how they work for such low pay and the hours that they did it was just not right. When visiting the slums, it was heart breaking to see the conditions that people lived in, but what was so inspirational was the sense of community, no matter what the situation was the people of that village cared and supported one another through thick and thin. This was a village that you would never know about unless you visited it, it was out in the countryside and was a long road that lead you into it. This is just one village, just think of the many thousands of villages in the world that you would never think existed but they do and that’s where the world’s poorest people live.

This trip was the core and what inspired and lead me to developing a full-size project, I faced lots of barriers, but that happens to everyone when you start something new like a business or charity and the first thing I knew I had to do was

get the project of the ground and create partnerships. I was in my last year of secondary school at the time and had 2 months left, my former head teacher helped me connect with other schools in Renfrewshire and partner up with the local food bank. With his help and support and commitment to tackling poverty I will always thank him for helping make the projects trial year in 2014 a success and setting the foundations to continue and expand.

In 2015 I was on my own with an ambitious plan of expanding my project and over the year I increased partnerships from 11 secondary schools into 9 primary Schools, Doosan Babcock and the biggest backing of all the Local Authority. The local authority has been supporting the project ever since because it’s fits well with their tackling poverty mission and they held their first collection in August 2015 at the chief Executives request.

I want to make my project The One Initiative – Making Changes Project connect and build relationships with businesses, schools and the local authority because I believe if we all work as one we can influence and succeed in tackling poverty if we work with the local communities that we serve we can get ideas and support to build a sustainable future for all. We can only work as one and we can only make changes together, I can’t do this on my own.

I have created The One Initiative – Making Changes Project for all of us to share in making changes together, I have launched 2017 the year of progress and that is what we are going to do in Renfrewshire and in Glasgow we can set our own goals and targets, we can join forces with Renfrewshire and do it as One or do it as One within our own Local Authority areas. We already have the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals that 194 member states including the United Kingdom have signed up to complete 17 goals with 169 targets by 2030 previous known as the Millennium Development Goals from 2000 – 2015. Although the Millennium Development Goals were not complete we must take inspiration on what was achieved so far and the commitment to the world to continue to tackle world issues and make our world more sustainable.

Every day Renfrewshire is changing, we have the city deal projects starting soon, we have the bid for Paisley 2021 City of Culture. We, the citizens of Renfrewshire are always coming up with new ideas and ways in which we can adapt to the ever-changing world and how the shape the fast-changing world around our own area of Renfrewshire. There is also the transformation of the town centres throughout Renfrewshire. We are made up of many close communities that have ties to one another let’s use these ties to plan and implement change for the present day and years to come.

Let’s make changes and do it together, lets lead Renfrewshire in leading the way in tackling poverty in the United Kingdom. Let’s set an example and inspire other towns and cities to follow us and work together as One and bring sustainability to the present day and the futures to come. Let’s set an example to the world and showcase our talents and be a community, be the ones that help inspire the world leaders to fight poverty in their own countries and take passion and determination in doing it.

The One Initiative – Making Changes Project PartnershipsRenfrewshire

Trinity High School Renfrew High School

Park Mains High School Johnstone High School

St Andrew’s Academy Gryffe High School

St Benedict’s High School Linwood High School

Glennifer High School Castlehead High School

Paisley Grammar School St James’s Primary School (Ren)

St Paul’s Primary School Williamsburgh Primary School

Todholm Primary School St Anthony’s Primary School

Langbank Primary School Bridge of Weir Primary School

St Anne’s Primary School Bargarran Primary School

Heriot Primary School Doosan Babcock (Renfrew)

Renfrewshire Council Intu Braehead/ Intu Braehead Soar

Renfrewshire Food Bank

Our Success So FarThe Food Bank Food Rush Project

Making a difference since 2014

Strengthening our partnership working, delivering effective and sustainable change, Believing and succeeding

To work as One and together, for us all to play our part and support each other in every town and city, in every local community

Creating and developing a new future for our citizens, through our own vision and to act to making changes

To lead the way and to serve upon as we Make Changes together in tackling all kinds of poverty

Renfrewshire 2014 - 2021