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Mission planning and statistics

Key contact: Alison Peacock

The Mission Planning Officer resources understanding of context and the development of appropriate diocesan and local mission strategies through the delivery of: 

• Parish and community maps and statistics
• Commissioned area and thematic profiles
• Advice on accessing and using statistics for different purposes
• Partnership projects with regional and national information provides.

Ours is the ‘age of information’. Sometimes, overwhelmed by expanding numbers of data sources, surveys and performance targets, this can feel like information for information’s sake. 

But information can also be used to resource strategy and practical action: as the slogan of the Northwest Regional Intelligence Unit puts it, we can move from ‘information to intelligence’. And, from a church perspective, information can be used to inform and support strategies for mission in its widest sense. 

GIS – A tool for mission planning

Geographic Information Systems (GIS), combining coordination of maps and statistics with powerful visual display capacity, provide a tool for the task. They are increasingly used by a wide range of organisations, including government and private companies, and now also by the Church of England. 

Thanks to an innovative partnership initiative involving the National Church Institutions and the English dioceses, every diocese has its own Geographic Information System (GIS). Current applications of GIS across the Church of England include: 

• pastoral reorganisation
• land, property and asset management
• statistical analysis. 

But GIS is more than an administrative tool. Its display capacity enables us to see patterns and identify key issues, and to explore responses. Manchester’s GIS has been developed with these goals in mind. It is more than a gadget, but a tool for mission planning both by local parishes and the whole diocese. 

What’s held on Manchester’s GIS?

The diocesan GIS holds the definitive parish boundaries as supplied by the Church Commissioners. Following pastoral reorganisation, revised boundaries ensure that maps are kept up to date. Parish boundaries are also used to create team, deanery, archdeaconry or diocesan boundaries. 

The GIS also holds select administrative boundaries, for example Local Authority District or Westminster Constituency. These are used alongside parish or deanery boundaries, showing connections and relationships between ecclesiastical areas and national and local government. 

New statistical geographies, Census Output Area (COA) and Super Output Area (SOA) have recently been added to the GIS. These are important because they provide basic building blocks for the creation of parish population statistics and deprivation scores. They can also, as this map illustrates, be used to highlight variations within a parish.
To show the connections with the physical geography, all boundaries and thematic maps can also be displayed against Ordnance Survey 1:10,000 scale map tiles. 

How can the GIS resource local initiatives?

Manchester’s GIS can be used to explore the fine detail of parishes and local neighbourhoods. Examples include: 

• Provision of socio-demographic data to support parish and community audits.
• Identification of particular areas and issues to support funding applications by parishes and community groups.
• Impact studies to demonstrate the success of local church and community projects within the neighbourhood.
• Mapping church buildings and schools within particular regeneration areas. 

A parish information pack, based on select data currently held on the GIS, is provided free of charge to parishes and people on accredited ministry training courses. Contents may vary as data is continually updated, but the pack will usually contain the following items: 

• A colour A3 topographic map showing the parish boundary against a 1:10000 scale map tiles.
• A colour A4 thematic map showing the parish boundary against the Index of Multiple Deprivation 2004.
• A report including select church data and statistics from the 2001 Census.
• A report listing the parish scores based on the Indices of Deprivation 2004.
• Explanatory guides to the parish data. 

For a copy of the parish information pack or additional map and data requests, contact Alison Peacock.