Using research to enhance and embed policy and practice which promotes children's participation in decision making.
Lead Research Organisation:
Swansea University
Department Name: School of Human Sciences
Abstract
Abstracts are not currently available in GtR for all funded research. This is normally because the abstract was not required at the time of proposal submission, but may be because it included sensitive information such as personal details.
Publications
Charles A
(2019)
Engaging Young People as Partners for Change: The ur Community Project
in The International Journal of Children's Rights
| Description | Findings from the research can be grouped into three main categories: 1. Research process: • Young people evidenced that they are able, in a sophisticated fashion, to understand, contextualise, and disseminate research findings. Using participative methodologies, youths used research findings, drawing out key thematic issues that affected their neighbourhoods and promoted debate concerning these with their peers and adults • The project has shown that, located within appropriate and child-focused methodologies, research processes can be developed to facilitate debate between adults and young people, challenging for example, images of children, understandings of their ability to participate in 'adult' fora, and promoting the formulations of proposals for change and improvement 2. Embedding participation and improving understanding: • Young people believed that they should be accorded greater opportunities to participate in the decision making processes of agencies and their local communities. Critiquing existing approaches, youths reinforced the finding that there is a chasm between their understanding of participation compared to the views of adults • Young people felt that a more consistent, rights-based approach was needed to embed their participation. However, such an approach was deemed to only be possible within a context of partnership between youths and adults • When discussing the roles of adults and agencies, youths articulated the concept of a 'quadralogue'. This partnership process was intended to highlight the critical need for sharing experiences, data, and views between young people, policy makers, researchers, and service providers. Young people felt passionately that existing multi-agency arrangements required review and augmentation to enable the reflection of their views within policy and practice • Young people demonstrated that they are able to develop recommendations for the improvement of policy and service delivery. For example, when debating the efficacy of Police And Communities Together meetings (which youths felt were not child-appropriate) young people offered positive recommendations to Police Officers concerning the desirability of Youth PACT's, Police surgeries in Schools, and a more expansive role for Police Community Support Officers 3. Participative innovation: • Young people felt that traditional forms of communication and engagement were not 'fit for purpose' and, focusing on the UNCRC (1989), advocated the development of E-tools (especially an iPhone/iPad app)to promote the right to participate • Through the research process, youths concluded that they have a role to play in informing their peers about the right to participate. Hence, a DVD containing a film about the Youth Conference, and an animation featuring images of Swansea and poetry written by young people about community safety was developed, as also an information pack for School Councils |
| Exploitation Route | Findings have been used and taken forward in three principal ways: Firstly, young people have themselves been involved in a process of participative, and youth-led dissemination Secondly, agencies in Swansea have reflected upon, and taken forward aspects of these findings, and the views of young people in their work Thirdly, further academic work has been undertaken to explore key aspects of young people's participation, in areas identified as important by them |
| Sectors | Communities and Social Services/Policy,Education,Government, Democracy and Justice |
| Description | The findings have been used in three main ways: Firstly, by young people themselves. Young people participants have engaged in a process of youth-led dissemination. This has included promotion of the School Council packs developed through the research project, development of electronic media to promote participation, and additionally, engagement with the Welsh Government to help create the first children's rights app in Wales Secondly, multi-agency collaboration and embedding. Following the conclusion of the funding period, work continued with local agencies to promote research findings. Findings were shared with local partnerships (such as the SMAT and YOS), and also promoted via the Swansea Participation Network. Additionally, research findings helped to underpin Swansea Council's unique approach to embedding children's rights, achieved through incorporation of the UNCRC into the Authority's policy framework, and the imposition of a 'due regard' duty on the Council. The PI for this project supported (and continues to support) elected Members and senior Officers in this process, and was a co-author of the final report that went before Cabinet and Council. The sharing of findings was also the focus of a Strategic Insight Project grant (in 2013), which was obtained to explore how academic and policy interface between the Local Authority and the University of Swansea in the area of children's participation and rights could be strengthened Thirdly, research findings have helped to fuel an on-going and growing series of research projects in Swansea that focus on children's right to participate, and children's rights more generally. Operationalised through the Department of Criminology at Swansea University's work placement and internship programme (of which the PI is co-ordinator), third year students have, in partnership with local agencies, undertaken empirical research, which has become the basis of their final year dissertations, into areas of activity that focus upon, and relate to, children's participation and rights |
| First Year Of Impact | 2011 |
| Sector | Communities and Social Services/Policy,Education,Government, Democracy and Justice |
| Impact Types | Cultural,Societal |
| Description | Working in partnership with the Local Authority to develop a robust child-rights policy for Swansea |
| Geographic Reach | Local/Municipal/Regional |
| Policy Influence Type | Participation in a guidance/advisory committee |
| Impact | We worked with the Council's Cabinet to develop a unique policy to embed the UNCRC into the Council's policy framework, imposing a due regard on the Council's executive, requiring the publication of a children and young people's rights scheme for Swansea and creating a role for the University as external monitoring body for this policy. |
| Description | Development of a youth participation standing conference and the integration of the conference within a local, strategic participation network |
| Organisation | Swansea University |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Sector | Academic/University |
| PI Contribution | A multi-agency meeting was held during October 2011 to discuss research findings. Attended by representatives from a range of agencies including: academics from Swansea University; Local Authority Cabinet Members; Local Authority Officers; Senior Police Officers; Children and Young People Partnership Officers; faith community representatives; youth justice Officers; criminal justice and community safety Officers; third sector representatives; Safeguarding Board Officers; School/education professionals; Children in Wales; Save the Children Cymru; Community Justice Interventions Wales; Youth Justice Board Wales; and the Welsh Government, the multi-agency meeting agreed to the formation of a Youth Participation Standing Conference. The Standing Conference was intended to sharpen local focus on, share, and explore the potential application of research (especially that being undertaken locally) concerning youth participation in decision making. Agreement has been reached between Swansea University (through the principal applicant who was Chair of the Standing Conference) and the City and County of Swansea (through its Children and Young People Participation Manager) to integrate the Standing Conference with the emerging multi-agency Participation Network for Swansea. Agencies have agreed to this merger. Swansea University will continue, through its membership of the Participation Network (which feeds into the Swansea Children and Young People Parternship) to play a central role in promoting the dissemination of research concerning youth participation, and exploring how enquiry can be used to generate positive outcomes, for example, via evidence-led policy re-alignment and service improvement. |
| Start Year | 2011 |
| Description | Engaging with the Local Authority |
| Organisation | Swansea Council |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Sector | Public |
| PI Contribution | We have been asked to support an external monitoring role as the Council has progressed a robust child-rights focused policy and service development agenda. |
| Collaborator Contribution | Supporting the Council through advice and planning to undertake research to understand the embedding and operational reality of children's rights. |
| Impact | Engaging, via membership of a Cabinet Advisory Group to support the work of Cabinet Members and Chief Officers - The Advisory Group is multi-agency in character |
| Start Year | 2013 |
| Description | Development of a participation information pack for school councils |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A magazine, newsletter or online publication |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | Yes |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
| Results and Impact | Following the Youth Conference which was held during July 2011, the young people steering team responded positively to a recommendation emanating from the Conference to design a participation information pack for secondary School Councils in Swansea. Hence, an information pack was designed in partnership with the young people steering team which included key research findings that were intended to promote discussion at School Council meetings concerning youth participation in decision making. Findings were included relating to the concept of participation and its operation in family life, education, young people's personal time, and in the community. The young people steering team were eager that the information pack should be user friendly and thus, its format was designed to be youth-appropriate and included images generated for an animation which youths agreed should accompany the participation information pack. A participation information pack |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2010 |
| Description | Production of a research process and youth-generated animation DVD |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | Yes |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | The young people steering team contributed to the development of a DVD which captured the research process that led to a Youth Conference in July 2011, and also contained an animation that was set to poetry by youths. The research process film featured footage from meetings of the young people steering team, key findings from research, and excerpts from the Youth Conference. The animation that was developed with the young people steering team was set to poetry which was offered during the Youth Conference concerning community safety (the Conference's main theme). Young people wished the animation to reflect aspects of their community and the types of activities in which they normally engaged. Thus, a design process was constructed, enabling young people to choose images, influence the final story board, and contribute to the editing of the animination. The young people steering team agreed that a copy of the DVD should be sent to every secondary School Council in Swansea to promote engagement and to disseminate research findings in a youth-appropriate format. A DVD containing a research process short film and an animation which is set to poetry by young people. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2010 |