RR 602 Work-focused services in children's centres pilot: evaluation baseline report
By: Rachel MarangozovThis report provides findings from the baseline stage of the evaluation of the 'work-focused services in children's centres' pilot.
The work-focused services in children's centres pilot is one of a suite of Child Poverty Pilots that were announed in 2008. The pilot is operating in ten local authority areas (30 Sure Start children's centres in total) in England, providing work-focused services through a dedicated Jobcentre Plus Personal Adviser, as well as activities and provision designed to support local parents into the labour market.
The aim of the pilot is to test whether children’s centres can offer an effective means of engaging parents in labour market activity, moving them closer to work and ultimately into employment.
A mixed methods evaluation is in place to assess the impact of the pilot and explore experiences and perceptions of its implementation. The evaluation includes surveys of centre users, interviews with parents, staff and stakeholders and analysis of DWP administrative data and data collected specifically for the evaluation.
The baseline stage of the evaluation consisted of:
- a review of the pilot bids
- a baseline survey of children's centre users, which took place in January 2009 and
- familiarisation visits to the children's centres, which took place in December 2008 and January 2009
The findings are also supplemented by publicly available labour market and demographic statistics.
The evaluation is being undertaken by the Institute for Employment Studies (IES).
September 2009 91 pages 297x210mm
ISBN 978-1-84712-640-5
(552KB)