research and evaluation

Education and lifelong learning research findings No47/2009: production of case studies of flexible learning and support packages for young people who require more choices and more chances

The study, commissioned by the Scottish Government, was intended to inform a series of papers on ‘Building the Curriculum’ being prepared as part of the implementation of Curriculum for Excellence (CfE).

The Good Childhood Inquiry

The Good Childhood Inquiry was commissioned by the Children's Society and launched in 2006 "as the UK's first independent national inquiry into childhood. Its aims were to renew society's understanding of modern childhood and to inform, improve and inspire all our relationships with children." On 5th February 2009, the Children's Society launched the findings of the inquiry in the report entitled 'A Good Childhood: Searching for values in a competitive age'.

Data use in voluntary and community organisations

This study assesses the need and demand within voluntary and community organisations (VCOs) for relevant, analysed and well-presented data to support their work tackling poverty. The poverty agenda has shifted away from ‘top-down’ action by central government towards the engagement of local voluntary and community organisations. As small, independent groups with their own ideas about tackling poverty, VCOs represent a powerful, ‘bottom-up’ approach.

Data use in voluntary and community organisations

This study assesses the need and demand within voluntary and community organisations (VCOs) for relevant, analysed and well-presented data to support their work tackling poverty. The poverty agenda has shifted away from ‘top-down’ action by central government towards the engagement of local voluntary and community organisations. As small, independent groups with their own ideas about tackling poverty, VCOs represent a powerful, ‘bottom-up’ approach.

Research on the Pensions Education Fund in 2008/09

This document comprises two separate reports on research undertaken in 2008/09 on the Pensions Education Fund (PEF). Part 1 is on the costs associated with the delivery of the main outputs associated with PEF, such as workplace seminars, by Risk Solutions, and Part 2 on the role and activities of pensions information intermediaries (or pensions ‘champions’) in the workplace, by IFF Ltd.

Mind changers : Programme 2 : Jean Piaget (Radio 4 series: Landmark experiments in psychology)

The second programme in the series looks at the work of child psychologist Jean Piaget who believed children learned through play. Subsequent experiments allowing children to imagine different social, rather than spatial, situations have had very different results. Claudia Hammond asks how far we should rely on Piaget's findings today.

Assessing illicit drugs in wastewater

This report presents a number of contributions that relate to analysing communal wastewaters for drugs and their metabolic products in order to estimate their consumption in the community. This area of work is developing in a multidisciplinary fashion, involving scientists working in different research areas. For this reason, the contributions to this publication come from a variety of different perspectives including: analytical chemistry, physiology and biochemistry, sewage engineering, spatial epidemiology and statistics, and conventional drug epidemiology.

Living on the edge of despair: destitution amongst asylum seeking and refugee children

This report is based on a research study carried out by The Children's Society in the West Midlands during 2007. Charities in the West Midlands have become increasingly concerned about destitution amongst children. The British Red Cross destitution clinic in the West Midlands identified an increasing number of babies, children and young people coming through the project, mainly with their parents.

Evidence Based Practice and Policy Online Resource Training Center (EBPP)

The Evidence Based Practice and Policy (EBPP) Online Resource Training Center, is sponsored by the Willma and Albert Musher Program at the Columbia University School of Social Work (CUSSW).

The online center’s broad goal is to promote evidence based practice and policy in social work. It provides training materials, publications, and other resources to aid practitioners from a variety of helping professions in the process of formulating sound professional judgments that necessarily precede, shape, and direct thoughtfully selected assessments and interventions.

Towards a popular, preventative youth justice system

In 1998 Labour made significant reforms to the youth justice system. A decade later these have failed to reduce offending. This report proposes ways in which the youth justice system could reduce offending, as well as ways of creating public confidence in the system. Contents include: why we need a new approach to youth justice; a tale of two targets - why a new approach is needed; objectives, barriers to, and new principles of youth justice; can a new direction be preventative?; will the public support popular preventionism?