7 July 2011
The House of Commons Education Select Committee recently published its inquiry into services for young people. In its report, the Committee says that NPC’s Well-being Measure – our new tool designed for charities and schools to evaluate their impact on young people – provides a ‘template’ for the evaluation of youth services.
The cross-party committee of MPs was set up at the end of 2010 to investigate the state of youth services, including whether resources could be spent better and how their effectiveness should be assessed. As part of the inquiry, NPC was invited to submit oral and written evidence.
Overall, they recognise that outcomes are hard to quantify but that ‘it is essential that publicly funded services are able to demonstrate what difference they make’. However, the committee heard evidence that organisations often lack the tools to be able to do this.
In its recommendations, the MPs urge government to get better at measuring impact and cite NPC’s Well-being Measure as an example of good practice. The committee’s report states that providers of youth services should ‘take account of personal and social wellbeing measures, young people should be closely involved in [their] design and application and [they] should be simple and inexpensive to administer. New Philanthropy Capital’s wellbeing index presents a good template for initial consideration.’
NPC welcomes the recommendations of the report. Using our Well-being Measure, we look forward to working with front-line organisations to help improve services for young people.
If you are interested in using NPC’s Well-being Measure or want to sign up for our regular newsletter, you can email us at wellbeing@philanthropycapital.org. (Please note that NPC’s Well-being Measure is currently only available in the UK.)
Watch this space for further details – coming very soon!
