# T4B Circle minutes April 6th

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April 6th

## Agenda
1. My Best Life
1. Tech for Better speakers!
1. Process for selection and starting projects
1. Feedback from FAC19 on TFB so far
1. What to do with experts we've already spoken to - those who want to get going now esp.
1. Documenting the TFB leads - what's the status

### My Best Life

How's it going? Do you need any support?

Positive week last week running design sprint around Tool to make services easier to find. This week building a Chrome Extension that gives recommendations of services and can relate to content of pages being viewed.

Funding secured for stage 3! :tada:

### Finding Projects

Getting more expert speakers. Gregor has reached out to those who have expressed interest in TFB & Council.

ACTION: Gregor to follow up.
ACTION: Beth to reach out to Wayne.

Open to non-Covid related projects?

We're doing things differently for a couple of reasons - harder to do it remotely; respond to immediate needs of organisations; discussions are easier to manage - not all are related to COVID-19.

Less tech for better applications coming in. We can hold sessions on Tuesdays only to fill the sessions up.

ACTION: Gregor to reiterate to FAC19 that we are looking for projects.

### Selecting and starting projects

Internal selection for FAC19 - will be similar to usual. Discovery workshops will come in second half of programme and will likely be in individual teams rather than full classroom.

FAC19 will get first refusal on projects.

### Feedback from FAC19

G is not actively seeking feedback on the process just now - can do if the circle would want this.

Feedback on individual PO's should be scheduled into the curriculum.

### What to do with experts we've seen

Some want to get going now. Graduate sessions from overspill sessions (Wednesday) have offered up a couple of projects that are ready to go. A couple of issues:
i. Nobody from FAC19 has been present at these sessions - ACTION: Gregor to invite any relevant experts to a Tuesday session.

Cathy is almost ready to go and likely has funding. Put this out to FAC18 if they're willing to work unpaid for the beginning. This was in a Tuesday session.

Opening up projects to FAC18, even those who haven't attended the session.

### Documenting the TFB leads

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March 30th 2020

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## Agenda:
* speculative process
* slides for students: feedback
* wider network of orgs experiences of covid19 (callout)
* schedule discussions we need to have
* additional graduate discussions

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## Presentation:
* description of t4b on website
* talk to more people in less time rather than jumping into discovery workshops
* asking people to invest less time
* serves their interests more if they are not required to come into workshops immediately
* smaller groups to avoid domination in participation
* summary of discussion in issues
* process of interviewing PO to decide interests
* focus on response to covid19
* funding pots available for projects
* funding applications in order to solve job uncertainty
* "Founders"
* June may see a rise in opps
* 3 week project to lay foundation for longer engagement depending on funding
* opens up space for continuous work in difficult circumstances

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#### Feedback:
*Clarifying questions:*
**J:** slides make sense, understands the way things have changed/direction. Clarity on defined schedule. Where is the line between graduates and students? Is there an opportunity to go from t4b projects working on now and being funded beyond FAC?

**D:** That is right. Fundraising will go towards paying graduates to continue working on the projects and for someone with more experience to support it. Intended for current students to take something away for paid work later.
Depends on timing. Talks where students are not present and graduates were - if they find interest in that problem then they should take the opportunity to put in funding application (those situations will be less supported by FAC because of time constraints). If possible, will help with funding applications. Hopefull that graduates will make some. Students need to have some agency in this, we are doing applications on their behalf, they need a lot of support and guidance. We would require them to share the lead with G and D, and possibly with J and B.

**G:** Same question about distinction between students and graduates. No clarifying questions.

**D:** Reiterate its all very speculative - there's a big desire to fund projects of this sort - compressing the timescales for funding but we can make the most of those opportunities. Can keep a lot of graduates busy for a significant amount of time. Worth putting effort into even if long shot

*Concerns:* none.

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## Networking:
- [ ] Communicate with FAC18 and encourage people to reach out adn find out what orgs are doing in this situation.
* Lots of f2f orgs that have to rethink how they function.
* Online forums to support online learning.
* Interesting to discover specific needs that are really ameanable to prototyping.
- [ ] Collect email addresses.
- [ ] Create a link for more information and make sure the doc is comprehensive.
* Messaging poeple immediately would encourage more response rather than group message.
- [ ] Read over message from G and add comments/update.
- [ ] Get in contact with our council contacts to discuss support services they provide.
* Limit to types of organisations?
* Would locality affect the choice?
* Islington would be first point of call but can be wider.
* Assumption that we will access funding pots so orgs will be chosen based on that.

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## Tuesday Speakers
* 4 speakers tomorrow
* difficult to know if graduates will be able to attend sessions - may not carry out wednesday each week: depends on attendance.
* All 4 should facilitate the sessions.
* For graduate sessions: stick to 2 speakers at a time
* **D:** fine if 1/2 grads are interested, we can still have a good group to discuss with the PO.
* More engagement the better but dont want to overload students.
* People may have experience in applying for funding.

Concerns: please share some notes on facilitating.

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## Scheduling
4 groups on Tuesday
2 groups Wednesday
Open to flexibility if more groups are present