RESEARCH AND EVALUATION

Research and support around effective approaches to early intervention and early help, and the impact of the pandemic

In 2019, we published research, commissioned by the Local Government Association, into the factors that contribute to local areas being able to develop, embed and sustain an effective, partnership-based offer of early help for young people and families. We followed up that research with a series of regional seminars for professionals involved in the leadership, planning and delivery of local early help offers.

As we all know, 2020 saw the coronavirus pandemic take hold in countries across the world. One of the implications of this period has been the need to adapt the way that systems of early intervention and early help, for families, for young people and for very young children operate in and respond to the challenges of the pandemic. This has been a significant focus of our current work, where we have –

• recently published research on behalf of the First 1001 Days movement that explores the impact of the coronavirus crisis across the UK on babies and their families in the first 1001 days, the implications for local services, the factors that have shaped local responses, and the lessons and challenges for the future;

• recently published research on behalf of the Local Government Association that has explored how local education and children’s services in eight local areas have responded and adapted to a year of the coronavirus pandemic, and the implications for the future of the education and children’s services systems, and following on from which we will be undertaking research commissioned by the Department for Education on the future role of LAs in relation to the planning of educational provision and support for vulnerable children; and

• continued to work with a number of individual local areas to refine their early help strategies and systems of support.

See other current projects