HeadStart Kent Programme Board
19th November 2014,
5.30pm – 7.30 pm,
Oakwood House
Attendees: Nick Fenton (Chair), Angela Ford, Sarah Hindle, Andy Heather, Jess Mookherjee,
Lauraine Griffiths, Heather Goodacre, Nicola Farrell, Mark Kerr, Eileen McKibben, George
Hales, Kelly South, Ugochi Nwulu, Alex Holmes, Sharon McLaughlin, Dan Bride, Ellie Ransley,
Tim O’Brien, Peter Heckel, Julie Stones, Sarah Gow, Chris Blanc, Louise Fisher, Marie Royle,
Alison Small, Julie Albone, Jo Tonkin, David Weiss, Grace Dennis (notes).
Comments
Action
Programme Board
Main Presentation 19 11 14 AF UN.pptx
1. Introductions and Apologies – Nick led introductions of attendees to the second
HeadStart Programme Board meeting. Angela showed a video – ‘famous failures’ – which
links into the ethos of HeadStart as it shows how famous faces have picked themselves up
and moved forward after adversity, building their resilience. Angela said how this
Programme Board meeting has three elements; 1. Evaluation - the Lottery are asking us
where we are as a programme and where our intelligence is taking us. 2. The Knowledge
Seminars. 3. The 15th December Big Lottery Workshop and our theory of change – we
need this for our development of the Stage 3 bid. This meeting is to assess where we are
and where we should be.
2. Project Updates – Angela discussed the HeadStart Partnership Agreement and the
importance of the board members signing the agreement cards with their contribution to
HeadStart, so the Big Lottery release payments. The Projects have started in each area
(Canterbury, Thanet, North West Kent) and are going well. HeadStart needs to link with
the Emotional Wellbeing strategy as this will contribute to service redesign and connects
to a system which enables change. Resilience is more holistic than just emotional
wellbeing so should HeadStart link into this? Where does HeadStart sit within the system?
Stage 3 phase will mean redesign. If anyone needs the link to the Emotional Wellbeing
strategy or any documents on HeadStart, let Grace know.
3. Evaluation & Evidence Update - Gochi gave attendees an overview of the HeadStart
Evaluation; we have national evaluators from University College London and the
University of Manchester. They have started to describe interventions and timelines and
common measurement frameworks that will be implemented next year and how
HeadStart can feed into them and how they can help us. We need to collect baseline data,
both qualitative and quantitative, which will be tied in with young people and what we
will focus on.. George talked about the evaluation meeting in London, which was
interesting to see the different areas from each HeadStart project, the discussions, with a
focus on young people’s evaluation of HeadStart Kent and understanding our priorities.
Kelly described the Shadow Board last week; we did an exercise on domains helped us
understand the different elements of resilience. The theory of change was represented
through a Chinese whispers activity; the outcome (the message reaching the last person
All/Grace
clearly) is achieved by the logic model supporting this (ie. repeating the message again,
looking at the message printed). At the Shadow Board we considered each Project and our
priorities, these are what young people think is important for each project and will make
the most difference and have the most impact. Components included the HeadStart
Resilience Mentors, Co-production and social marketing. The top 5 elements in each
Project are: Canterbury - Social media, Online promotion, Co-production, Knowledge Hub,
PRP family resilience. Thanet - Restorative approaches in primary school, Restorative peer
ambassadors, Restorative parent ambassadors, Secondary school curriculum package,
Restorative staff ambassadors. North West Kent - Safe Spaces, Resilience mentors, Online
service directory, Coping packs, Promotional Material.
How do we evaluate these priorities? Juli Dosad has worked with young people to design
HeadStart Young
People Leading graphic.docx
our HeadStart graphics.
We will use a pop up shop, peer sessions and competitions which should give us our most
effective feedback. We will hold a meeting in February to finalise the elements of the
evaluation and our pop up activity. Nick asked about the Shadow Board young people’s
numbers/ages, we need to broaden this, we are holding 5 Shadow Board meetings per
year. Jo Tonkin said we need to keep in mind young people focussed solutions, we need to
keep questioning. Jess Mookherjee asked what action learning is going on and what is
HeadStart doing to change it? George said we are bringing action learning to the Shadow
Board, and Angela reiterated that the Programme is about learning, if we need to change
something we can, it is about testing ideas. Julie Stone asked about bringing more
information on coproduction and consultation? Ellie said that young people have been
working with Amy Merritt and met with Helen Cook immediately before the Emotional
Wellbeing strategy consultation, so co-production is happening within the Project.
HeadStart
Knowledge Seminar Summary.pptx
4. Knowledge Seminars –
Mark Kerr discussed how resilience within
HeadStart is focussing on 10-14 year olds, it was asked what happens at 15? We need to
sustain resilience, we need consistency across services. There will be 4 Knowledge
Seminars during phase 2 of the HeadStart Kent project, therefore conceptualising
resilience and building a Community Of Practice. The first Seminar focussed on
understanding resilience in Kent and what it is, how resilience has evolved as a concept
over the years. Resilience is a combination of factors and it is argued we cannot
demonstrate resilience unless we have experienced adversity. Protective factors come
into play when looking at young people’s resilience. There has been some concern over
evidence based outcomes (potential negative picture of service),
managers/commissioners need to consider this. Mark discussed breaking down resilience
into factors rather than just one concept. The wider picture is important too, including
the community and social factors. Young people need the ability to navigate and
negotiate their way through support.
Mark discussed the HeadStart graphic and at the Shadow Board we looked at
what/who/how to achieve resilience, the idea ‘to allow me to have the ability to bounce
back’. The resilience domains are world-wide culturally. The Shadow Board will guide us
for young people’s questions/answers. Grace to send out the slides from the Shadow
Board to Programme Board members. We need support for families and parents as well as
young people. It was discussed how different programmes such as the PRP training in
Canterbury could need a 6 month boost after the training? What do you do at the end of
programmes with young people, how does it end so young people keep benefitting? Mark
described the resilience strings which can go across different domains.
Jess asked about resilience types, ie. if a young person has a temper, how would that
work? Mark said this example is like the domains. Jess said we need to factor in a young
person’s growth. Andy Heather said we need a balance between risk factors and
protective factors and can therefore identify how the balances shift. Mark said HeadStart
is more targeted ie. In the Thanet area we could predict what is more likely to be a risk
factor. There are risk factors within an individual, within a system and the community.
Eileen said that some factors we cannot control. Andy Heather said we can use data to do
some predictive analysis of risk factors. Jo Tonkin discussed the need to be mindful of the
individual and the community. Play, sport, talent, feeling good has been lost in the
system/services we provide. Mark asked where are young people going for support? How
are they accessing this support? Julie Albone said it is good to have more bespoke
programme and to look at individual needs within each district.
Mark discussed the ways forward for Seminars 2 and 3 (slides). Angela reiterated how the
domains are useful to frame our conversations. Jess said that the Emotional Wellbeing
Strategy is still under consultation, and that adult mental health are using similar ideas.
Andy suggested that we could use a range of factors in identifying if an individual is
resilient, or if a community is resilient and what we can do to recover. Jess said resilience
is often dependent on interactions with other people. Eileen talked about strategic
evaluation frameworks within councils/organisations. Jo Tonkin said how HeadStart is a
partnership, including the VCS, the health system – we need to hear from all partners if
this resonates with them and their vision.
5. Updates - Angela discussed a potential Operational Group for HeadStart for people
within the system with responsibility, to implement HeadStart, as our weakness is that we
need more systems’ viewpoints therefore enabling change, rather than just meeting once
a quarter. This will inform the Project Groups and the Programme Board. Who in Early
Help should be involved in this discussion? Florence Kroll? The Heads of service? VCS?
Julie said we can learn from change and data. David agreed we need a small group for a
look in, to support an Operational Group. Nick asked who was at the Knowledge Seminar?
The attendees are on the Seminar report.
6. Logic Model-
Gochi introduced the Logic Model; a visual statement of activities that
will bring about change, we will be using it to plan the evaluation and it will reveal data
gaps/needs, informing a common language so we can describe and evaluate together. We
need to name interventions, providing a snapshot of why, what materials, procedures,
who provides, who receives, where this will be delivered, how much, and tailoring. One
intervention can have a lot of aspects/reasoning ie. Safe Spaces example. We use
interventions, then change mechanisms, resulting in outcomes. We asked the Programme
Board to help us with these outcomes, asking what do we need for these to be achieved?
What indicators will demonstrate these outcomes? Jo Tonkin said some outcomes have
been specified by BL themselves. Answers included that we need to capture context and
impact, politically and financially. Adult services should make sure they consider the
impact on the child, so is a whole system impact on the family. A whole family approach
was emphasised. We need to be clear this is about building resilience and not
dependence, we need to build young people who are resilient and life ready, not using
services for the sake of it, we should challenge young people and not wrap them in cotton
wool. An idea could be to widen the concept of corporate parents, so we achieve a one
single child workforce. We need to prepare the workforce to work in a systemic way.
Big Lottery are facilitating a Review Workshop on the 15th
December which will be the first of four Workshops. Phase 3 for the £10m bid is only in
two meetings time. Jo discussed how the evaluators may look for self-efficacy within the
HeadStart Project and how we need to take this further.
7. Project Support –