New report highlights power of peer-led evaluation
/Barnardo’s Scotland and SCDC have published a new report which shares learning about peer-led evaluation and the impact that the Barnardo’s Nurture Service has had on the people involved.
SCDC was asked by Barnardo’s Scotland to help evaluate the programme and work with participants and workers across a series of sessions in early 2019. Peer-led evaluation is a process where the people involved in a piece of work, both workers and participants, co-design how it’s evaluated.
Through this work, we learned valuable lessons about how to develop a peer-led evaluation, the difference working with Barnardo’s Nurture Service has made to participants and set out a potential model for closer involvement of peers into an evaluation process.
Learning from the approach of developing a peer-led evaluation
There was significant learning around how the project was evaluated, with findings including:
The importance of building the capacity and confidence of participants and how this must be carried out in a way that is participant-led and works at their pace.
There are core community group work skills required to deliver this type of evaluation.
By working in this way participants felt confident to describe both the nature and impact of the support received, where traditional evaluations might not have done so.
Peer-led evaluation could be used as a complement with other evaluation approaches.
The impact of The Nurture Service: a collaborative endeavour
Participants described the often-significant impact that being involved with Barnardo’s Scotland had on them, their children and their family’s lives, including:
Better family relationships.
Access to peer support networks.
Improved family communication and practical parenting skills.
Greater understanding of child development.
Improved ability to deal with parent’s own emotions and circumstances
Happier and less anxious children, especially with regards to significant life events.
The support was effective because it was co-produced ‘with, within and between’ participants and workers not ‘from or to’, meaning positive outcomes were created by both workers and participants, both bringing their skills and assets.
“Barnardo’s has given me a chance to meet other people – that you’re not the only one going through those things.” - Participant
“I’m more confident and can take charge of situations.” - Participant
We hope that this report provides some insight into these efforts to deliver a peer-led evaluation.
This offers an approach to evaluation which differs from ‘standard’ approaches in that participants have a greater input into what is considered worth evaluating, and how that evaluation might be carried out. It is not a quick fix or easy solution – but the creation of deep understanding seldom is.
Martin Crewe, Director of Barnardo’s Scotland said:
“I’m delighted to see such a positive evaluation for this important piece of work. This is a great example of co-production and working in respectful partnership with the children and families we support. We are grateful to SCDC for their expert delivery of this evaluation.”
Fiona Garven, SCDC Director, said:
“We were delighted to work with Barnardo’s Scotland to evaluate their project and develop new learning around the importance of peer-led evaluation.
“Along with demonstrating the value of Barnardo’s Nurture Service, it also underscores the importance of supporting people and communities to shape how projects are evaluated and the valuable learning that emerges.
“We will continue to work with organisations such as Barnardo’s to support peer-led evaluation and look forward to learning more about the positive contributions communities can make in evaluating services in the future.”
About SCDC
SCDC supports best practice for community development in Scotland and has extensive experience around all aspects of participatory evaluation and community-led action research.
We work with communities, practitioners and policy makers to share learning and best practice across a range of work areas, including community capacity building, community empowerment and democratic renewal.
About Barnardo’s
Barnardo’s Scotland work with more than 16,300 children and young people in over 140 specialised community-based services and 95 shops across Scotland. We believe in children and we believe every young person has a right to thrive. Our vision is to realise Thomas Barnardo’s dream of a world where no child is turned away from the help that they need. Our work includes: fostering and adoption services and support; helping children break free from sexual exploitation; supporting young people leaving care; helping young people in to employment and helping children living in poverty.
Visit www.barnardos.org.uk/scotland to find out how you can get involved and show you believe in children.
