Judi Alston on breaking down barriers with technology

One to One Development Trust is an arts organisation and registered charity (1105935) that uses film, virtual reality (VR), video game design, and other creative approaches to work with communities, breaking down barriers and inspiring positive change.

The Creative Director and CEO, Judi Alston, is the founder of One to One Development Trust. Judi was one of the social enterprises that attended the Changing the Narrative event in Glasgow, bringing with her their latest project Streets of Change. Using this VR narrative experience, guests were able to see into the realities of homelessness in an entirely different way. She often works with marginalised and underrepresented communities to help amplify their voice.

INSP: What role do you think technology and media can have in creating change?

Judi Alston: I think what technology, media, and creativity can do is speak to something that’s part of the human condition. To me, using something like VR as an immersive tool has a lot of potential to put the audience into a situation they would never normally be experiencing. From that, you can genuinely evoke empathy and emotions that are quite profound. Immersive media is an extraordinary medium for doing things like this about homelessness because it’s quite literally putting somebody in that position as a rough sleeper.

What inspired you to create a virtual reality experience on homelessness?

In the past, we’ve worked with people who are homeless and it’s hard raising awareness, so looking at using different ways of storytelling can add to the impact. We got asked by West Northamptonshire Council to make a documentary film with people that are homeless, those who were rough sleeping or have struggled and are in recovery from addiction. In addition to the documentary film, we were asked to create a single street scene for VR. As we started the process of exploring VR to raise awareness of homelessness, we realised that what we should do is push the boundaries and make a full narrative story. We sort of defied all logic in terms of time scale, budget, everything. We saw such good potential for harnessing VR to raise much-needed awareness. It became a real labor of love for all our team.

What has the reaction been from the homelessness sector and the public?

One of the first people that went on it [Virtual Reality experience] was somebody that had been homeless before and asked, “Have you ever seen the film Trainspotting?” I said, “It’s one of my favorite films, I really love it.” There have been lots of comments about the realism of Streets of Change, how creative storytelling has impacted the audiences and evoked emotion. To me, one of the best compliments, was from somebody who was a rough sleeper, an IV drug user, and is now working in this field, he said “it took me right back to being on the street, everyone needs to see this to understand how it feels to be vulnerable and invisible”. I thought that perception was insightful, and it was because they were fully immersed in a 360 environment. Some of the other responses were interesting as well. People have been giving their donations to charities, or said it shifted how they see people on the street and have become more aware. One of the things I’m really pleased about is one of the homeless charities in Northampton (The Hope Centre) has invested in buying 5 headsets to run Streets of Change to fundraise for their work and raise awareness. Another community group of volunteers who provide food for the homeless every Tuesday night, have also bought a VR headset to help them get donations for food. I'm very interested in these practical responses that VR can evoke and what changes it can evoke in someone’s behavior. What we want to do is get it to people like strategists and politicians to look at Streets of Change as a provocation to help increase understanding and bring more funding in to support homelessness.

What connections do you see between your work and the work of street papers?

I love street papers and regularly buy The Big Issue so finding out more about the International Network of Street Papers has been interesting. It’s fascinating getting insight into street papers from other countries and how the INSP model works. I am very interested in different methods of storytelling. Technology is never going to totally wipe out print publication; but the two have an awful lot they can bring to the table. Working together, I feel like it’s a good synergy. Street papers have got a huge archive of work and there are all sorts of potentials for digitization, to make digital stories from it, and to target different audiences. I guess that we’re at the start of that conversation, and I don’t quite know where that’s going to go yet. I feel like we’ve got a good alignment, have shared values and this event has brought us closer together.

What more do you think can be done to change the narrative on homelessness?

That’s a big question, isn’t it? I think one of the key things is that the narrative has to keep being told. What I’m interested in is finding new ways of telling stories. You’ve got to keep challenging the system in different ways. Now, that might be VR. In another 5 years, that might be something else. It’s embracing as many ways as you possibly can. I always see creative outputs like newspapers, books, music, film, games and VR/immersive experiences as different ways to inspire people, evoke empathy, compassion and understanding; each medium is like a different tool in a toolbox. What you’ve got is a whole load of tools for changing narratives and making social change, and you bring out what is needed at the right time.

For more info about One to One Development Trust and their work you can visit https://onetoonedevelopment.org or use #StreetsofChange on social media.