Participant Information Sheet

Participant Information Sheet and Consent Form

Title of Study: Strengthening Cumbria’s Civil Society.

Project Partners

Part of a research and knowledge exchange partnership between the University of Cumbria, the Office of the Lord Lieutenant of Cumbria, Ambleside-based charity Cumbria Development Education Centre (CDEC) and the local consultancy Thinking Philanthropy. 

Also contributing to Joanna Stanberry’s PhD research on 'Reconsidering Sustainability Leadership'

About the project

This project is intended to help build a deeper understanding of the diverse roles and contributions of civil society towards a more equitable and thriving community life in Cumbria. For example, the term ‘civil society’ is often not clearly understood. Essentially, civil society is about activities undertaken by people outside of the workings of governments and business that seek to improve communities and their environments and to help those in need. Civil society organisations and groups include larger service-delivery organisations to smaller local organisations or community groups with few or no paid staff including those which are volunteer led and meet neighbourhood and local community needs.

The project seeks to be as inclusive as possible by offering a diverse range of formal and informal civil society groups and organisations an opportunity to contribute to the study. To this end, the Project Partners are reaching out to their own civil society networks across Cumbria and are identifying smaller, informal groups via publicly available online and local community sources.

The study is addressing the following two questions: 

-What is most needed to create a more thriving and equitable community life in Cumbria? 

-What is working already that makes us a strong, connected, and flourishing place to be?

This study will enable the Project Partners to enhance their relationships with civil society groups and organisations across Cumbria, and to enrich their understanding of how civil society is already contributing to community life in Cumbria and what is most needed to strengthen civil society.

The study also forms part of PhD research by University of Cumbria Postgraduate Researcher Joanna Stanberry which seeks to better understand how the ideas of Ambleside-based Victorian education reformer Charlotte Mason (1842-1923) could help inform the kind of sustainability leadership needed for more socially, environmentally, and economically thriving places. To do this she is developing a set of statements representing how people, including Mason, think about sustainability leadership. These will be offered to participants as an additional statement-sorting exercise should they opt in to participate.

Joanna’s research is being supported by her main supervisor Dr David F Murphy, Associate Professor in Sustainability & Collaborative Leadership.

Please see below some key information about taking part in the study. Feel free to contact Joanna or David, if you’d like any more information – our contact details can be found below. 

Would you like to be involved?
Some questions you may have about the research project:

Why have you asked me to take part and what will I be required to do?

You are being invited to be a participant in this study because you are a person who may have opinions and ideas to share about the current activities of Cumbrian civil society groups and organisations, and how civil society can enhance community life in Cumbria. You must be 18 or over to complete the online sorting exercise. 

You will be asked to sort statements about what is most needed to create more thriving and equitable communities in Cumbria. You will be asked to judge which statements you believe to be most important, and which you believe to be most unimportant, and then to place them into boxes based on your ranking. 

Following the statement-sorting, you will be given a survey with questions to answer based on your experience of sorting and ranking the statements. These responses will be used to understand the various viewpoints present. Your written responses to the survey may be used to help describe these viewpoints, and may be included in reports, academic publications, and other communications regarding the study. When these responses are communicated, your name, title, and organisation name will not be used. The sector and size of your organisation may be used in association with your words. Every effort will be made to anonymise responses by removing identifying words and phrases.

Your responses will help enhance our understanding about civil society and community life in Cumbria and your perspectives on them. Your contributions, as described above, will be disseminated locally and in nationally and globally focused forums to help shape discussion and policy.  You are one of the experts about your community's needs, and we want your voice to be heard.

The online exercise will normally take around 15-30 minutes to complete.

You will also have an opportunity to share information about the work of your organisation or group and others that you work with both online and through follow-up discussions and conversations. We are interested in learning about what is already working that makes Cumbria a strong, connected, and flourishing place.

What if I do not wish to take part or change my mind during the study?

-Your participation in the study is entirely voluntary.
-You are free to withdraw from the study at any time without having to provide a reason for doing so.
-The study is not anonymous to the research team, and you will be asked for your name and role in civil society in your survey responses. 
-If you choose to volunteer for a follow-up interview, we will also request your contact details. You can choose not to provide your name or role if you wish. 
-As described above, best efforts will be made to anonymise your participation in publicly disseminating the findings of the study.

What happens to the research data?

Your responses will be collated and analysed to enable us to identify and understand different viewpoints about the contributions of civil society to community life in Cumbria. 

This will also help to build the PhD thesis, which combines multiple sources of data including this survey.

All data generated during this research will be stored in a password-protected file on the University's system. The data will be retained for five years after research completion before being destroyed/deleted.

We will request your name, and if you choose to volunteer for a follow-up interview, we will also request your contact details. You can choose not to provide your name or role if you wish. 

The legal basis for using the data collected during this research. 

The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) requires that any personal data collected is used lawfully and, notwithstanding the giving of your personal consent and in line with the University of Cumbria’s legal constitutional position as a UK Research and Innovation organisation. The data collected in this research project will only be used for purposes in the public interest. This research has been assessed and granted ethical approval by the University of Cumbria’s Research Ethics Panel.

How will the research be reported?

The initial product of this research and knowledge exchange project will be a report prepared and published by the study partners and which will be publicly available via the project website.

We hope this work will also be of interest to practitioners and researchers in Cumbria and further afield so we will look for opportunities to present at both practitioner and academic meetings, workshops, and conferences, as well as seeking publication in academic journals and more widely in practitioner publications and other print media.

The findings will also form part of Joanna Stanberry’s PhD thesis. Her thesis will be published online, and it is hoped that this work will contribute to conference presentations, formal reports, and publication in academic journals amongst other outlets.

How can I find out more information?

Please contact Joanna Stanberry or David F Murphy, directly:

Email: joanna.stanberry@cumbria.ac.uk  or david.murphy@cumbria.ac.uk  
Postal address: Initiative for Leadership and Sustainability (IFLAS), Institute of Business, Industry and Leadership, University of Cumbria, Ambleside, Cumbria, LA22 9BB

What if I want to complain about the research

Initially you should contact the research team directly. However, if you are not satisfied or wish to make a more formal complaint you should contact Dr Paul Miller, Chair of Research Ethics Email: research.office@cumbria.ac.uk