DEVELOPING PRACTICE
QUALIFICATIONS DIRECTORY
Add practice

Social Justice Ambassadors programme: poverty and equity

TITLE OF DEVELOPING PRACTICE EXAMPLE

Social Justice Ambassadors programme: poverty and equity

CONTEXT / BACKGROUND

Involving children and young people in the decisions that affect them is vital.  Through evaluation of PEF, school leaders, Stirling’s Team lead for Excellence and Equity (TL) and the attainment advisor (AA) identified that it would be beneficial to consider meaningful approaches to involving CYP in the decision making around PEF.  Although many schools were able to see the advantages of involving CYP, they were unsure how to do this in a way that was sensitive to circumstances, context and meaningful.   

 

Discussions with Stirling’s Youth Participation team identified that this team had already developed an approach which could be utilised, with amendments, to suit the needs identified.  The programme developed was the ‘The Social Justice Ambassadors Programme:  Poverty and Equity’.  It is a problem based learning approach to support young people understand the socio-economic challenges facing learners. The intention of the programme is to: 

  • raise awareness and understanding of the impact of poverty and equity on learning for children and young people in their own community 
  • upskill a diverse group of learners to become young researchers. The young researchers then lead a piece of research to understand challenges within their school community, capturing the wider schools experiences.  
  • Once these experiences have been captured, the young researchers work within a collaborative team (staff and pupils) to identify resources/spend to tackle the challenges.  This new knowledge will be used to help inform decision-making around PEF and young people will have been able to make informed choices about poverty and equity. 
WHAT WE DID

Initial programme:   
The Social Justice Ambassadors is a project that was initially co-designed by Stirling Youth Forum and Stirling’s Youth Participation team. The forum had the vision of all young people being confident in using their voice and being heard. Therefore they co-designed interactive/fun learning sessions for young people and this became the prototype for the Stirling ‘Toolkit’. This was successfully piloted by The Youth Forum with a group of 51 young people.  It culminated in ‘The Sitting’.  An event where the young people presented 19 motions regarding community issues in their areas to lead staff from across Stirling including elected members, third sector and Stirling Community Partnerships.  They listened to young researchers present their findings, then had an interactive café conversation to explore ideas further.

Further development:  Toolkit development with Education Scotland and Scottish Attainment Challenge 

  • After the Sitting, the ‘Toolkit’ took its next development:  to invite young people to have a conversation on the theme of ‘poverty and equity’ within their schools and communities. The intention was not to lead young people’s thinking but to ‘lighthouse’ key areas of the new theme ‘equity & impact of poverty on learning’. Young people would then develop and further investigate the topic from a point of their own interest. Critical to these topics was the self and community/ changes in poverty/ equity challenge.
  • Stirling’s Youth Participation team worked alongside Stirling’s attainment advisor to research and develop the concepts needed for the programme.
  • Pilot projects at Wallace HS and Riverside Primary School (2019-20).  The aim was to capture the challenges that the wider school population were experiencing and for the young researchers to collaborate with staff on directing the PEF spend.  Staff were trained in the approach to ensure it was a self-sustaining model.  Face-to-face small group work was the approach used by the Toolkit and so when Covid-19 closed school buildings the programme was paused.  However feedback was positive from school staff in terms of the programme’s ability to raise awareness of the impact of poverty on learning for children and young people and their positive engagement in the programme.

Further development:  Social Justice Ambassadors programme:  poverty and equity  

  • Feedback from the Youth Participation Digital SJA:  COVID 19 programme for secondary schools highlighted the continued effectiveness of this approach.  Therefore the Social Justice Ambassadors programme: Poverty and Equity was updated and resources were revised in light of COVID and current context by the AA in October 2021.
  • All resources are available online for schools and a Teams Group has been developed to support the sharing of resources, regular feedback on the resources.  There are network meetings scheduled throughout the year to support the staff and the delivery of the approach from the AA.

Next steps:

  • This programme is already evolving in response to feedback from school staff and learners.  It will continue to do so throughout the academic year.
  • If feedback is positive, this programme will be offered to all schools in Stirling as well as the FVWL RIC.  If appropriate, it could be considered as part of the national toolkit being developed for the refresh of SAC in 2022/23.
IMPACT / OUTCOMES
  • 5 primary schools are currently participating in the programme.  They are working with a mix of learners but all are from the upper stages of primary school.  Some will be starting the programme in January 2022. 
  • This programme will allow schools to work alongside learners in 2021/22 and involve them in the decision making around PEF for the 2022/23 PEF plans.  We are also discussing hosting an event for all learners to share their ideas with each other and other partners across the local authority. 
Links

Social Justice Ambassador Promo video

LA

Stirling

CONTACT PERSON

Jacqui Ward

You May Also Be Interested In