Tandem Collective incubates and produces inclusive, innovative and inspiring creative collaborations which engage with environmental and social issues. Our projects find original ways to platform these issues, and empower community members to bring their ideas to life. Tandem has its roots in volunteer activity and Oxfordshire’s Community Action Group (CAG) network and, as a result, has extensive local knowledge and a strong local partnership base. Our work enables our community to work together to take action, create, and celebrate. Since its inception in 2014, Tandem has launched a variety of creative projects, including Tandem Festival, Ethno England, InTandem Publications, RISE zine and Tandem Skills Camp. Tandem also co-founded the Green Arts Oxfordshire Network. Currently, our main project is Starling Sessions, Oxford’s Global Folk Community Orchestra. This year has been a year of notable growth and development for the Starling Sessions project. With the support of funders including Swan Mountain Trust, and partners including Asylum Welcome, Oxford Refugee Health Initiative, and Old Fire Station, we have been able to increase our reach, engaging more participants and developing our access work, as well as testing new initiatives with different participant groups. In 2024 we have: - delivered 35 weekly open sessions - given 9 public performances: - One World Fair (Ashmolean Museum) - Barton International Food Festival - Tap Social Fundraising Performance - Oxford Sanctuary Fair, for Asylum Welcome (Oxford Town Hall) - Oxford Sanctuary Hosting Celebration - Offbeat Festival (Old Fire Station) - Ark T’s Winter Lights Festival - Oxfordshire Community Foundation Giving Tuesday Celebration - Bright Nights Festival (Old Fire Station) - Delivered 4 event-specific workshops with partners and festivals: - One World Fair Workshop (Ashmolean Museum) - Oxford Sanctuary Fair Workshop (Asylum Welcome/Town Hall) - Offbeat Festival Workshop (Old Fire Station) - Visited the asylum accommodation hotel in Blackbird Leys for informal performances every half term - Delivered 2 bespoke workshops at the asylum accommodation in Blackbird Leys to support asylum seekers to gain confidence and attend our regular sessions - Delivered 1 training day for new music facilitators as part of Offbeat Festival - Trialed a new families workshop model, delivering a ‘Starlings Nest’ workshop at Bright Nights Festival - Worked with Agrigento & Philip Flood to develop our organisational structures and create a team development plan for 2025 - Undertaken a Storytelling evaluation process with Old Fire Station to examine our impact (report available on our website) Our audiences and beneficiaries have grown this year: - 70+ individuals have attended our regular sessions - Average weekly attendance has grown from 25 in 2023 to 35 in 2024 - We estimate we have reached 950+ audiences through performances and workshops during this year. We undertook a Storytelling Evaluation, led by Old Fire Station, to find out more about the impact of our work. This report took testimonials from participants and explored the common themes and impacts across all interviewed participants. The process revealed many unknown outcomes of the project as well as confirming that we are meeting our aims, and gave us plenty to reflect on as we plan for the future of the project. Key impacts revealed were that participants: - Felt a new sense of belonging in Oxford - Gained musical, social, and language skills - Became more confident and rooted in their communities - Joined other activities (e.g. starting a band, volunteering) - Developed an effective network of practical peer support - Gained social capital through high quality performance - Fulfilled creative ambitions - Formed meaningful friendships - Gained deeper insight into their own and others’ cultural heritage - Experienced improved mental health Partnership with Asylum Welcome and Oxford Refugee Health Initiative - We have been and continue to work closely with Oxford Refugee Health Initiative (OHRI) and Asylum Welcome to ensure those most in need are referred to our sessions. GPs and medical students working with ORHI are able to ensure that asylum seekers and refugees are signposted to our sessions and have transport support to access them. - We provide practical access support such as taxi transport and meals to enable participants from the Holiday Inn asylum accommodation hotel to join our sessions. - We take the whole group to do informal performances at the Holiday Inn asylum hotel accommodation once each term. - We have run several pilot workshops at the hotel to build confidence in music-making with this group. - We have been working with Asylum Welcome and in consultation with participants to design and test a new strand of activity for hotel residents. In response to demand, we are planning to offer music skills workshops/instrumental tuition for people from the asylum seeking community who would like to join Starlings but need more musical grounding/confidence to feel able to join. We were also successful in our applications for funding from Arts Council England and National Lottery Fund for the project in 2025-26. (If applicable, please just state “A social audit report covering these points is attached”).

Tandem’s stakeholders are: - Oxford’s cultural partners - Volunteers, participants and audiences - Funders (National Lottery/Oxford Contemporary Music/CAGOxfordshire/Oxford City Council/Oxford Community Impact Fund/Oxfordshire Community Foundation) Participants of Starling Sessions are consulted on a regular basis about the activity through a variety of feedback methods, including open meetings, online forms, and creative activities. This input guides our planning for the ongoing development of the project. Partners and funders are consulted via regular reporting and collaborative conversations.

Full details are provided in our accounts under Starling Sessions & Asylum Welcome Activities – Project Coordination Costs, Facilitation, and Workshops and Talks Fees. And for the organisation website build under administrative expenses/other legal and professional

No transfer of assets other than for full consideration