Agenda item

To receive an update on the activity of the HeadStart Programme and the wider Resilience Revolution.

Ms Pauline Wigglesworth, HeadStart Programme Leader presented the Resilience Revolution’s annual report, covering the period from September 2019 to August 2020. She informed the Committee that the report had been co-produced alongside young people, parents/carers, practitioners, leaders and academics.

The Committee was informed that the HeadStart programme had been funded by the National Lottery Community Fund (TNLCF) as part of its strategic programmes. Ms Wigglesworth reported that an investment of £13 million had been made over six years in order to test and learn new ways of supporting youth mental health. Blackpool had been selected as one of six sites nationally and had developed a community approach to building a resilient town for young people to grow up and thrive in, under the banner of the Resilience Revolution. She informed the Committee that TNLCF funding would cease on 31July 2022 and assured Members that there had been rigorous attention to sustainability over the last 12 months, with funding for successful projects having been identified and sourced by the Council, schools and the NHS.

The Committee sought additional information around the sustainability of projects and the levels of further funding which had been achieved. Ms Wigglesworth explained that as part of the grant award from TNLCF, a phased funding approach had to be demonstrated over the final three years which identified how the projects would continue to be funded. During that period, a number of activities had been withdrawn, some had been embedded by teams to be incorporated into new ways of working and a number of projects had continued via the allocation of additional funding from other sources, such as the NHS.

In relation to workforce training, the Committee questioned which groups had been trained on the resilience model and whether any gaps in training had been identified. Ms Wigglesworth reported that Children’s Services had engaged well with the training, as had voluntary sector staff. In terms of gaps, she advised that further engagement from Health would have been preferred but she acknowledged the difficulties faced by Health colleagues in taking time away from their places of work, particularly during the pandemic and noted that overall she had been pleased with the level of training completed.

Ms Wigglesworth summarised a number of highlights from the annual report, which included ‘A Year of Parents of the Revolution’, consideration of the in-depth analysis of the results of interviews held with a selection of young people who had been involved with Youth Engagement activities and details of actions being initiated by schools following audits undertaken to identify schools’ assets and to identify areas for resilience building.

The Committee noted that the report referred to 2019/2020 and asked for examples of any further successes which had been achieved since that period. Ms Wigglesworth advised that HeadStart’s final report was anticipated to be completed in April 2022 and offered to return to the Committee with the report once available. The Committee was informed that the report would be in both written and digital form, with the aim of including a choice of ways in which to access the information in order to make it as accessible as possible. In the meantime, she provided a selection of performance data from December 2020, which identified that 19,000 young people had benefited from HeadStart interventions overall and that a successful online speech, language and communication toolkit had been launched across Blackpool schools.

Ms Hannah Eaglestone, Peer Sessional Worker for HeadStart and lead for the Blackpool Beating Bullying Project provided an overview of the anti-bullying campaign being implemented across Blackpool schools, explaining that Blackpool Beating Bullying was a campaign that was set up by young people, for young people with the aim of reducing the amount of bullying incidents taking place in Blackpool schools. She informed the Committee that the UK’s first co-produced charter mark had been introduced, which aimed to equip all schools with the necessary tools and knowledge to tackle bullying. To date, 12 schools had achieved the bronze award and five schools had gone on to achieve silver. The Committee questioned if ways in which bullying could be stopped had been identified as part of the campaign. Ms Eaglestone advised that prevention was key and that schools had adopted a zero tolerance approach in the hope of preventing bullying from occurring and creating a culture where no levels of bullying were tolerated. Committee Members noted that bullies were often unaware that their behaviour was bullying and queried how this thinking could be tackled and changed. Ms Eaglestone reported on work being undertaken with primary schools which identified what bullying looked like and encouraged children to reflect on their actions and behaviour to consider the impact they might have on others.

The Committee noted that 28 schools in Blackpool had signed up to the project, but questioned what was being done to reach the remaining 18 schools which had not. Ms Eaglestone advised that she continued to make contact with these schools every six weeks to offer support and seek their engagement but acknowledged that schools had numerous competing priorities and were not always able to commit to another new project immediately. She highlighted that a number of Blackpool’s special schools were also involved in the project, with Park Community Academy having achieved the bronze charter mark and that all learning material could be adapted by schools to ensure their pupils could access them.

The Committee requested an update on the reported Friend for Life initiative, whereby adult volunteers were matched with our children aged 10, 11 and 12 for fun and friendship. Ms Wigglesworth reported that the adults made a permanent commitment to be there for their young person and that our children chose their adult via video submissions. Further to the reported 18 friendships, Ms Wigglesworth informed Committee Members that this number had now reached 28 and that all original matches had continued throughout the restrictions of the pandemic.

The Committee extended its thanks to Ms Wigglesworth and Ms Eaglestone for attending and for the positive work being undertaken by HeadStart.

The Committee agreed: To receive the 2022 HeadStart final report once available.