News

Sure Start exists to focus the efforts of various agencies to help children out of poverty. Here Sure Start Unit head Naomi Eisenstadt offers an overview of the initiative's progress.

I am delighted to be contributing to this first issue of 0-19. My hope is that this new magazine will publicise best practice in how health, education, social services, environmental services, housing and transport can work together for children.

Our Sure Start experience demonstrates the complexity of influences on children, from the economic and social position of mothers during pregnancy through to environmental impacts during the teen years; it seems to take considerably more than a village to raise a child in a rapidly changing Britain.

Sure Start works to bring together the agencies and organisations that have a key role to play in children's lives at local level and at national level. The Sure Start Unit itself is jointly accountable to Estelle Morris, the secretary of state for education and skills, and Yvette Cooper, the minister for public health. At local level, the partnerships that set up and run Sure Start programmes include officers from the local authority, the key local health agencies, voluntary organisations and parents.

The importance of parents in the running of Sure Start cannot be overstated. They help to identify what has not worked in the past, and how services could be improved to better meet their needs and their children's needs.

We have just launched an expansion of Sure Start programmes. This will add 85 new programmes to the 260 already approved, and the further 170 which are in the pipeline. We are still on target to reach our goal of 500 programmes operating by March 2004. We expect that Sure Start will reach about one-third of children under four living in poverty in England. The big challenge for the future is how to influence mainstream providers so that the two-thirds of young children who do not live in Sure Start areas benefit from what we are learning about designing and reshaping services.

Naomi Eisenstadt is the head of the Sure Start Unit

Norfolk parents' success

The "Community Parent Network" set up by Sure Start Great Yarmouth has been so good at finding parents work that it has become a victim of its own success. The scheme, which is accredited through the Open College Network, trains parents to become "community parents". Their role is to visit families within the community and educate them on what Sure Start has to offer. The course is challenging and developmental. Of the first group of 18 parents to join, seven have now gone on to find jobs within similar professions. This has been a notable achievement for the programme, though to ensure that they have enough staff the Community Parent Network has had to place a minimum work period of six months to a year for each person trained. However, they are continuing to train new people and there are currently 10 parents on the training course.

Sure Start's "prep school"

Sure Start Sefton is helping to get schools ready for children by awarding local nursery and primary schools with "schools excellence marks". Six schools are currently taking part in the project's pilot scheme, in the hope of being awarded the first school's excellence marks. The local education authority has been involved and the programme aims to link the Sure Start principles with the services offered in schools. Schools will be assessed and then awarded an excellence mark when they meet 10 criteria that cover things such as school ethos, relationship with parents, and school learning environment. Sure Start Sefton doesn't expect that the excellence mark will involve much extra work for the schools, however, as in many cases it acts as a validation of their already strong commitment to the community.

Read and Play is just fine

Recent consultation with Sure Start Peterlee has resulted in Durham County Council scrapping library fines for children's (aged 0-4) books across the county. Sure Start Peterlee persuaded Durham County Council to reshape the library service by integrating a "Read and Play" club along with the other services they offered. The club lends toys, books and videos to children and does not fine for late returns of children's books. The Sure Start Bookworm card provides an automatic library membership and is valid at all the borough's libraries. The First Read and Play club has only been up and running for eight weeks, yet it has seen a 100 per cent increase in borrowing. Two more Read and Play schemes will be established soon

The price is right for Oldham babies

Sure Start Oldham's "baby bulk buy" scheme is so successful that its organisers are planning to expand it. The scheme is an example of a small community working together to benefit everyone. A board of nine Sure Start parents joined forces to set up the non-profit bulk buy scheme. The board has its own bank account and holds meetings where members decide on products to purchase such as nappies and home safety equipment. Sales are held at local venues such as parent and toddler groups, where the goods are sold to parents at cost price.

For further information about Sure Start, including a full list of the new districts announced, see the Sure Start website at www.surestart.gov.uk