The first report of the evaluation of the Improving Futures programme being undertaken by Ecorys, Family Lives, University of Nottingham and Ipsos MORI is now available. The report is based on the analysis of data gathered through the following sources:

*  Scoping visits conducted to all 26 Improving Futures projects

*  A review of family intervention policy and practice across the UK, conducted for the programme

*  Monitoring data gathered at a programme level for beneficiaries, using the Improving Futures Monitoring Information System (IFMIS)

*  Workshops conducted with project staff at a national learning event in October 2012; and

*  In-depth qualitative telephone interviews conducted with the project manager for a cross section of Improving Futures projects.

The main themes explored for the report, include partnership working; engaging families and supporting families, before setting out the next steps for the evaluation.

The full report can be accessed here.

If you have any queries on the report or the evaluation, please contact the evaluation team on improvingfutures@uk.ecorys.com

Scotland’s Children’s Minister Aileen Campbell today announced £757,000 funding to put third sector bodies at the heart of developing children’s services in Scotland.

The project will be delivered by a partnership between Barnardo’s Scotland, Voluntary Action Scotland and the Improvement Service, with support from other third sector partners, to make sure that all groups working with children and families are in partnership.

Ms Campbell said:

“I am delighted to be able to announce this investment with the third sector for a national partnership as we launch Wellbeing Week in Scotland. This is a key milestone in our commitment to improve the communication between all of those working to support children.

“Families across Scotland are seeing the benefits of our efforts to encourage better collaboration across different specialities across children’s services. Parents know they can expect good communication and shared expertise that always puts their child at the heart of decisions that affect them.

“This national initiative builds on the strides made by our Community Planning Partnerships (CPPs) and realises the huge potential of combining the resources, expertise and experience of both government and the third sector.”

The drive to bring together children’s services with wellbeing at the centre of it is at the very heart of the Getting it right for every child (GIRFEC) initiative.

SallyAnn Kelly, Senior Project Manager, Third Sector GIRFEC Project, said:

“The work of CPPs in delivering the GIRFEC agenda across Scotland is vital.

“The National Third Sector GIRFEC Project will play a crucial role in ensuring that the third sector is at the heart of local decision-making and planning across Scotland. The Project will work closely with CPPs to share the good practice that is currently taking place, as well as support developments to improve the interface between the third sector and CPPs leading to better services for children and young people.

“This is an exciting project that will help local communities to improve the outcomes and lives of children and young people.”

The project will run until March 2016 and will support Community Planning Partnerships to recognise and embed the third sector in promoting collaboration, partnership working and early intervention.

The February issue of the Improving Futures Evaluation and Learning quarterly newsletter is available to download below.

If you have any news items you would like to submit please send them to improvingfutures@uk.ecorys.com.

Please feel free to forward this email to anyone who you feel may be interested in subscribing to the newsletter and other related emails.

Click here to download our Quarterly Newsletter – February 2013

During November 2012, Ipsos MORI conducted interviews with parents across 5 Improving Futures projects as part of the pilot stage of the Improving Futures survey. We’d like to thank the projects involved for all of their help in running the pilot and for giving their feedback on the piloting process.

The pilot survey proved to be successful: parents were happy to take part in an interview, and generally found it to be a good experience.  The pilot survey has helped to identify some areas where we can make improvements when we run the main survey this spring. As you know, we are asking project staff to help identify families eligible for the survey and to schedule appointments with them, and the pilot has helped to show how we can manage this more smoothly.

We found that the number of parents eligible to be interviewed in the pilot varied between projects, and was sometimes slightly lower than we’d expected.  We have recently circulated a questionnaire to all projects to find out how many families you are likely to have in the coming months that will be eligible for the survey. Being able to get an accurate estimate of eligible families is really important in helping us plan fieldwork for the main stage of the survey. Many of the projects have already returned the questionnaire, but if you haven’t, please do send back the questionnaire as soon as you can.

We are planning to begin the sampling of families for the main stage survey in March 2013, and then begin conducting interviews in April 2013. We will be asking for help from project staff in contacting families and scheduling interviews from March, and will be in touch with projects directly to discuss this in more detail.

If you have any questions about any aspect of the Ipsos MORI survey, please email improvingfutures@ipsos.com, and a member of the Ipsos MORI team will be happy to help you.

A summary of the findings of the pilot survey can be found here.

A new study by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation suggests that future Welsh education policy should emphasise parental involvement, extra-curricular activities and mentoring. The Welsh education system should combine both learning- and teaching focused interventions and student-, family- and community-focused interventions.

Parental involvement, extra-curricular activities and mentoring have the best evidence base of all family- and community-based initiatives. Recent JRF studies show that some attitudes, aspirations and behaviours (AAB) interventions may contribute to improvements in educational achievement for children in poverty in Wales. However, there needs to be more detailed evidence on their impact, especially for Wales-specific programmes. Future interventions in this area should be rigorously trialled and evaluated before being rolled out widely.

Read the full report

Read our guide for practitioners on understanding family conflict, including the latest report from 4Children, a focus on the couple relationship and further resources.

Download the paper Family Conflict

November 2012

Introduction

This paper gives a summary of the main points on the proposed multidimensional measure released on 15 November to enable you to gain an understanding of how the way this country measures child poverty both nationally and locally may change.

Earlier this year the latest child poverty statistics were released, revealing that 300,000 children were moved out of relative income poverty between 2009-10 and 2010-11. The current Government explains this as being largely due to a fall in the median income nationally which lowers the poverty line. This means that children who were moved out of poverty were no better off or saw no significant improvement in their daily lives.

Following the release of the child poverty data, the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, the Rt Hon Iain Duncan Smith announced that new measures for child poverty would be proposed.  The current Government believes that just measuring income does not present an accurate picture of how children’s lives are affected by poverty.

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The November issue of the Improving Futures Evaluation and Learning quarterly newsletter is available to download below.

If you have any news items you would like to submit please send them to improvingfutures@uk.ecorys.com.

Please feel free to forward this email to anyone who you feel may be interested in subscribing to the newsletter and other related emails.

Please click here to view the November issue of the Improving Futures Evaluation and Learning Quarterly Newsletter.