About 500 Sure Start programmes have been set up in recent years in the most deprived areas of the country to transform the life chances of younger children through improved support. The gains are being measured as part of a longitudinal study by the National Evaluation of Sure Start but it will be some years before the full picture is known.
However, programmes are required to measure their performance through local evaluation and monitoring. They are coming under pressure to show outcomes of the innovative services they have developed as well as progress towards national and local targets. Often it appears to be difficult for local programmes to quantify outcomes, impacts and benefits to those families involved with services through the collection and analysis of data which show change.
It is difficult to evaluate efforts to tackle complex social problems that have multiple causes. The more an intervention tries to tackle the root of the problems and build lasting solutions from the bottom up, the longer it takes for any measurable impact to be felt – and the more difficult it is to tell whether any changes are a result of the original scheme or other factors.
This has been problematic in many cases. One professional in a local programme in the North West said of its pop-in service: "It is difficult with human behaviour to know what intervention has had what outcome. Is it because someone smiled at you as you walked down the road? It is difficult to isolate what the pop-in is doing for families. All we can do is constantly evaluate our approach and talk to families who attend the pop-in about what it means to them."
Although quantitative data analysis may be necessary to confirm large-scale change, the value of individual and personal accounts of change can be valuable. Such accounts can offer local programmes, evaluators and policymakers deep insights into the impacts that local programmes have had on individuals and consequently inform research practice and policy.
Since its establishment, Sure Start has boasted a strong "consumer focus". That is to say, there is an expectation that all local programmes will involve parents in the design, management and evaluation of the programme.
One mother said of her involvement with Sure Start Blacon in Chester: "In 2000 I gave birth to my third child. My health visitor told me about a government initiative which a group of professional bodies and parents were putting together, and asked if I would like to join the partnership board. I nervously agreed and many months and meetings later everything was finally agreed and we set up Sure Start Blacon. I was a key member in the planning process and was on the interview panels for the majority of the Sure Start team. It worried me that someone would come in without the experience of working with children and without knowing Blacon and set up services. I wanted to make sure the programme worked for local people.
"Within the four years that I was a member of the partnership board I spent two of them as vice-chair and chair of the executive group, where I have worked alongside many professional agencies, including social services, NCH, West Cheshire primary care trust and Chester Council.
"During my time on the partnership board I also decided to become a volunteer as I wanted to help more than just sit in meetings. As a volunteer I underwent a range of training and awareness days, including post-natal depression, domestic abuse, disability awareness and basic sign language. I also helped in the planning stages of the teenage pregnancy strategy. In December 2004 I started work at Sure Start Blacon as an employed member of the team as speech and language therapy assistant.
"Sure Start Blacon has made me more confident and more determined to have a voice in my community because I have always felt valued and respected. Whenever I talked I was listened to. As a parent I was thought to be equal to the professionals. I wasn’t just the ‘token’ parent to make up the numbers. I was a real local parent with first-hand experience of being with children and living within the community, and I had real local concerns.
"I was offered guidance yet not patronised, supported yet not dictated to. This helped me to become an outspoken member of the community and gave me the power to get involved and try new things. People think Sure Start is just for children, but Sure Start Blacon has changed my life, improved my family’s quality of life and I hope my continued involvement can help the programme help many other local families."
This extract from a personal account of how a local programme has affected the life of this mother and her family shows the value of listening to individuals’ narratives when evaluating Sure Start local programmes. While policymakers may favour hard data in establishing levels of local success, it may be difficult for local programmes to produce such figures.
In part this appears to be due to the difficulties programmes experience in collecting, storing and analysing data on individuals with what are often complex social problems. By collecting information on these individuals, professionals within local programmes are often aware of the paradox inherent in Sure Start services – data are required to evaluate the effectiveness of Sure Start and enhance future service and policy development – yet the act of data collection may deter some vulnerable and particularly "hard-to-reach" residents from engaging with the service.
This emphasises the value of using qualitative methods in the evaluation of Sure Start. Sure Start programmes are dealing with complex communities with complex problems. Just as each Sure Start area is unique, so is each individual’s denotation of their situation and their Sure Start experience. Therefore it is timely that an approach to conceptualising these very personal experiences be used to show impact and change. Furthermore, it may be possible for qualitative accounts of the changes which have occurred for people to be used to begin to define quantitative measures, against which programmes can measure their future success.
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Abstract
This article looks at the issue of measuring the impact of Sure Start programmes on family life. It uses a case study from Sure Start Blacon in Chester to illuminate the value of personal narratives in understanding the impacts of local programmes on families. This shows the importance of qualitative personal narratives in evaluating a complex intervention such as Sure Start.
Further Information
Contact the Author
Charlotte Pearson, Researcher, Centre for Public Health Research, University College Chester, Parkgate Road, Chester, CH1 4BJ
