Article written by Lisa Dietrich OBE, CRIS CEO
Community Relations in Schools (CRIS) is an education and peacebuilding charity inspired by educators who courageously mobilised for peace at the height of conflict, founding CRIS 40 years ago.
The organisation is supported by Community Relations Council’s Core Funding Scheme.
CRIS’s model of practice GRACE – Good Relations and Collaborative Education, centres on the primacy of schools as focal points in their communities to foster intergenerational peace and reconciliation.
Core impacts across our portfolio of work include:
- Development of inter-cultural understanding & reconciliation skills
- Development of durable relationships of trust and friendship across interfaces
- Building of place-based cross sector collaborations
- Cultivation of communities’ voice and leadership so narratives of mistrust and division become stories of hope and reconciliation
- Creation of a “new generation” of peacebuilders.
It is a fitting gift that in this, our 40th year, CRIS has been so fortunate to access the incredible support of LanciaConsult Belfast. LanciaConsult is an international consultancy firm with a base in Belfast. Lancia’s support has helped build our resilience both organisationally and at a personal level.
The State of the Sector
Due to the chronic fragility of the Community and Voluntary sector and particularly the peacebuilding sector, and especially in these acutely challenging times, organisations often struggle to plan for the medium and longer term. Indeed, planning in the short term can at times also pose difficulties due to a variety of compounding factors, all signalling a decline in the resilience and stability of community infrastructure and an increasingly constrained funding model.
Due to the investment made in CRIS via the Norther Ireland Community Relations Council (NICRC) core funding scheme and other core funding partners, we have been able to free up some time to work on areas of organisational development, critical to our ongoing position in the sector. It is our ambition to not just survive but thrive in these uncertain times. This requires acute attention to our own infrastructure, governance development, and succession planning activities.
A Pro Bono Gift from LanciaConsult
Over the course of eight months, CRIS CEO Lisa Dietrich and Finance and Administration Manager Elizabeth Castillo, worked with a team with Lancia, who provided pro bono support to make essential improvements. The focus of our project has been to develop a knowledge transfer and management process, mapping out the mechanics of how we operate across multiple critical priorities and capture this knowledge in user-friendly systems culminating in the creation of an interactive Knowledge Hub Handbook.
The process, carefully facilitated by Lancia colleagues has supported an increased understanding, refinement and improvement making of our own systems in areas such as financial management, risk management and HR processes – to name but a few.
This time, invested into governance control, risk mitigation and succession planning, allows the organisation to face future challenges with a new confidence.
Quote from Lisa and Elizabeth (CRIS):
It was a real pleasure to work alongside all the team at Lancia – their expertise and friendly supportive manner has made this journey one of enjoyment and impact.
Quote from Anna O’Neill (Lancia Management Consultant):
At LanciaConsult, we continuously seek partnerships to achieve a positive impact. We collaborate with charities and social enterprises to maximise the benefits in education and environmental initiatives in our respective jurisdictions.
“CRIS is a charity we deeply value at LanciaConsult. When we had the chance to help evaluate its organisational needs, enhance governance, and improve sustainability, we were thrilled to contribute.”
Read LanciaConsult’s complete Social Impact Report for 2023.
In Conclusion: We Can Achieve More Together
CRIS is generously core funded by the Northern Ireland Community Relations Council, and the Irish Government through their Strategic Partner scheme.
Multi-annual funding makes it possible for a peacebuilding sector to exist. Without it this invaluable infrastructure and dense tapestry of networked practitioners with niche expertise would dissipate.
The work of reconciliation remains as pressing today across our communities and critically – at a structural level. At CRIS, we aspire to a ”positive peace” that moves away from society’s tendencies towards instability, distrust and disharmony towards a more resilient society “that has the ability to absorb shocks without falling or relapsing into conflict” (positivepeace.org). Sustaining and building on the successes of the last 26 years will also require the health and wellbeing of Community and Voluntary organisations and workforce.
Working creatively to build great corporate partnerships and relationships with businesses of all sizes must actively be considered as part of this sector resuscitation and wellbeing agenda. For upon it will hinge the pursuit of “a lasting peace, built on sustainable investments in economic development and institutions as well as societal attitudes that foster peace” (positivepeace.org).
CRIS look forward to reaching out to the business sector in the times ahead to invite further participation in our work to mission “to inspire and equip whole school communities as powerful catalysts for peace and reconciliation.”
