HAF Impact Report reveals 121,856 hours of activity opportunites were provided to eligible children

In December 2018 Barnardo's and Leicestershire County Council Children's Services developed a Children's Innovation Partnership (CIP). The CIP was established to work collaboratively on co-design, coinvestment and co-create transformational changes using a 'service design approach'. As part of the CIP in early 2019 Barnardo's successfully submitted a grant application to the Department for Education for £798,000 to deliver local co-ordination of free holiday activities and healthy food for disadvantaged children (HAF) during the 2019 summer holidays.

Barnardo's took a partnership approach to this grant opportunity and developed a network of Improvement Partners; Leicestershire County Council, Voluntary Action Leicestershire and Leicester-Shire & Rutland Sport. The Improvement Partners then offered, via the Shire Grants portal, an opportunity for local providers to bid for local grants to deliver HAF to local children.

The eligibility criteria for the grant was to provide services to those children who were eligible for free school meals. This was an amazing opportunity to 'reach'a significant number of Leicestershire's children and their families. The aim was for children (and where
appropriate, their parents) who attended
this provision:

• To have access to and eat healthy food over the summer holidays.
• To be more active over the summer holidays.
• To take part in engaging and enriching activities which support the development of resilience, character, wellbeing and other skills
• To access safe provision; to access activities aimed at reducing social isolation; and to be more engaged with school and other local services and to have greater knowledge and awareness of local free holiday provision.

Local Approach

Local Approach Barnardo's approached the co-ordination of the grant via task and finish groups which were supported by their Improvement Partners. The task and finish groups met throughout the summer to provide strategic oversight of the programme. Barnardo's as grant recipient took the lead for the grant management of the programme. Barnardo's then worked in partnership with LRS to establish their role as the local Project Management Team. Again this creativity to deliver a complex high value and time bound programme was instrumental in the success of the programme. LRS have excellent project management skills coupled with local knowledge and networks. Rather than having one project manager, and due to the timescales of the programme, LRS initiated a matrix management approach to the programme with a number of team members being utilised to deliver elements of the programme.

Nutrition Workshop

Feedback from attendees indicated that 95% rated the content of the workshop as 'Very good' or 'Good'. Attendees were asked to rate their knowledge of the school food standards
and their confidence to deliver activities raising awareness of healthy eating and nutrition. Individual ratings were based on a scale of 1-10 (1 = very low, 5 = average, 10 = very high) and attendees were asked to rate themselves both before and after attending the workshop. Following the workshop, attendees indicated that they had improved their knowledge about the food standards and felt more confident to deliver healthy eating activities.

Physical Activity Workshop

Feedback from attendees indicated that 97% rated the content of the workshop as 'Very good' or 'Good'. Attendees were asked to rate their knowledge of the physical activity
guidelines, confidence to include a range of physical activity and the ability to adapt delivery to be inclusive. Individual ratings were based on a scale of 1-10 (1 = very low, 5 = average, 10 = very high) and attendees were asked to rate themselves before and after attending the workshop. Following the workshop, attendees indicated that they had improved their knowledge about the physical activity guidelines and felt more confident to include physical activity and adapt their delivery.

IMPACT

1,904 places of the 4:4:4 offer (equating to 30,464 meal opportunities and 121,856 hours of activity opportunities) were provided for those children and young people eligible for
free school meals. 2,023 children eligible for free school meals were recorded as accessing the sessions with 19,572 attendances by these children recorded throughout the summer
period. A number of suppliers were either able to secure additional funding or applied a charge to open up their sessions to non-free school meal children. This meant that a further 1,004 children were able to access provision during the summer holidays, which would not have been in place without the HAF funding.

Qualitative feedback regarding the impact of the programme has been sought from partners, suppliers, children and parents. Some of the key impacts have been listed below:

• Due to the holiday provision, young people were able to mix together in a safe and constructive environment rather than being isolated at home over the summer.
• New friendships were made between young people (including from different schools and backgrounds) and also between parents.
• Confidence levels of children and young people were also reported to have increased between the start and end of the programmes. One example was a child who would only stay outside at the start of the provision and engage in activities by themselves, by the end of the scheme they would run into the provision and participate in all activities.
• A number of parents reported to suppliers that their children would be doing nothing without this provision and expressed their gratitude for this service being available. Parents fed back that they would like sessions to take place during all school holidays.
• A range of different activities and experiences were provided and one young person described a visit to the police station as "the best day of my life." A five-year-old attended a session led by British Cycling and learnt to ride a bike around the cycle track (despite it raining all day!).
• Some suppliers targeted young people on the SEN register who were able to engage with other children of all ages and abilities and it was noted that foundation age children were able to try physical activity and sport.
• Suppliers reported benefits to the whole family. At some sessions parents had the opportunity to stay and get involved in activities (for example supporting children to make healthy pack up boxes at the start of the session, activities designed for all the family to stay) and in some cases this has even led to an interest in them volunteering in future. Family Fun Days brought carers and children together and where events took place on a weekend, families benefited from all being able to attend.
• A family that attended the Leicestershire County Council Edge of Care programme on a particularly challenging wet day enjoyed themselves so much that when their social worker went out to visit them later in the month the feedback was so positive it was worthy of adding to their file.
• A single mother with three children who were all missing education attended the scheme and as a consequence of working with community workers the children will all be in school from September.

For more information on the Leicestershire Holiday Activities & Food Programme,
please contact:

Barnardo's
www.barnardos.org.uk
Leicester-Shire & Rutland Sport
www.lrsport.org

Leicestershire County Council
www.leics.gov.uk

Voluntary Action Leicestershire
www.valonline.org.uk