Measurement Tools Spotlight - Doncaster Children's University

Doncaster Children’s University is a national charity run by the central Children’s University Trust in Manchester. Alongside YMCA George Williams College’s measures, the University captures life skills data via the Skills Builder programme[1] to show the categories of learning that children are engaging with and the kinds of skills they are gaining through engaging with the provision. The University shares insights from this data with schools and supports them to interpret it to shape their extracurricular offer.

Schools can see the categories of learning that children are taking part in, but more importantly, what skills they are learning. So, if there's a big gap in children accessing activities that will help them take part in leadership skills…we go to the school, ‘Okay! What are you going to do about that?’…you're going to give opportunities for your children to take part in these activities. And we will find external funding to host some activities…to help fill that gap in data

The organisation is using YMCA George Williams College’s measures to complement this dataset by providing insight into the development of children and young people’s socio-emotional skills.

The organisation commissions external partners to provide a wide variety of extra-curricular activities for over 8000 children aged five to 18 (or to 25 where young people have Special Educational Needs or Disabilities [SEND]) whose families would not otherwise be able to afford them. Among the regular activities offered are after-school clubs, swimming, football, cubs/scouts, and brownies/guides. The organisation also hosts summer camps and one-off activities and events including day trips and a science fair in 2024.

Doncaster Children’s University is using the Youth Engagement Survey (YES)[1] to measure children and young people’s engagement with the activities it provides. It is also using the Quality Practice Tool (QPT)[2] to assess the quality of the provision and to generate insight into aspects for improvement. To administer the measures to best effect, staff planned in advance when to introduce them to children and young people and at what point in the session to complete them. Although most children found the YES straightforward to complete, staff provided one-to-one support for those with SEND to do so.
 

Overall, the Children’s University has found the measures easy to use and has welcomed the extra insight into the impact of its provision that they have generated.

[The data set from the measures] really complements our data set, because we're looking at categories of learning and essential life skills, but picking up on the social [and] emotional aspect of learning fills that hole in that data set for us so we can actually see children's enjoyment levels combined with the skills that they're gaining at the same time

In addition, delivery organisations and settings have used insights from the QPT to tailor and improve their activities, and, in some cases, to inform their business models.

We did Lino cutting one week, and the kids found it really challenging which affected their enjoyment level. And we saw that straight away in the data the following week. [The delivery organisation manager] was like, ‘OK; so they didn't enjoy that week because it was really hard. That's really interesting’…it's made him reflect on, actually, what can I do to make this process easier for the children so that then they'll build that resilience up to [enable us to make the activity] harder later on?

When it first started using the measures, the organisation highlighted that it was not possible to have data from different cohorts of children on the system at the same time. They discussed this with the College, which then implemented this functionality.

Staff also struggled to locate a link to download a paper copy of the YES at short notice on one occasion. The College has now moved the downloadable versions of the measures to a more prominent location.

Doncaster Children’s University plans to use the measures with a school which has recently started working with them, combining the measures data from its existing provision to foster deeper insight into the development of children and young people’s engagement and skills.

We will be looking to incorporate the measures with a new Children's University School so we can get an overall picture of how Children's University can not only support the development of essential life skills but also the impact on children's socio-emotional wellbeing.  The triangulation of data will give us an insight into learner profile[s] and the elements that make up extracurricular learning and its impact

In addition, Children's University Project Lead Heather Coultard plans to use the measures with children with SEND who engage with her Forest School provision to identify how it impacts on their socio-emotional skills and wellbeing, and to explore quality practice in Forest School provision.

Please visit our measurement hub to find out more about our tools and how to use them.

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[1] The YES is a survey completed by young people to assess their mental engagement (e.g. enjoyment, inclusion, attention, and voice) during provision.

[2]  The QPT is a measure of the quality of provision, focusing on staff or volunteer practices that develop socio-emotional skills. It can be done as a self-assessment, a peer or manager assessment, or by a trained external observer.

[1] Further information about the Skills Builder Partnership can be found here: https://www.skillsbuilder.org/