Attainment Scotland Fund evaluation - families and communities: thematic evaluation report 2024

Evaluation Background

With the launch of the refreshed Scottish Attainment Challenge and its new mission in 2022, a new Scottish Attainment Challenge Logic Model, the result of extensive stakeholder consultation and collaboration, was published. This contained two new outcome areas - readiness to learn and children and young peoples voice in decision making, reflecting the importance of these areas to the Programme. These thematic areas along with families and communities form the three areas of thematic focus for the Evaluation in 2022/23.

Following on from the SAC refreshed Programme and publication of the Logic Model, the new Attainment Scotland Fund Evaluation Strategy 2022-26 was developed. The new Evaluation Strategy identified families and communities as a priority focus, along with readiness to learn and children and young people’s voice in decision making. The consideration of a range of thematic areas is an integral part of the new Evaluation Strategy, allowing an in-depth focus on collaboratively agreed key areas of enquiry.^[1] These aspects of thematic evaluation will seek to provide learning and increase the evidence base on ‘what works and what could be improved, for whom, and in what circumstances.’ It allows the Evaluation to continue to explore the theme of engagement with, and support for, families and communities in the context of the ASF and to gather evidence related to Evaluation question 8, and the related sub-evaluation questions, as set out in table 1 below.

Table 1: ASF Evaluation: Families and Communities Evaluation Question and Sub-questions

Evaluation question:

Evaluation Question 8: To what extent has the fund embedded engagement with and support for families and communities?

Sub-evaluation questions:

What has been learned about engaging with families and communities through the ASF?

What are the emerging impacts of engagement with families and communities as a result of the ASF? (e.g. improved understanding of families’ circumstances and additional support needs; improved understanding of local context)

What were the views of wider stakeholders (children and young people, families and communities, and third sector organisations) of approaches to engagement with and support for families and communities?

Families and communities are to an extent a broad umbrella area of thematic focus and it is important to acknowledge the interconnections between the three current thematic areas. For example, initiatives focused on supporting and engaging with families often involve activities that support improving attendance and engagement (readiness to learn) and seeking families’ and communities’ participation in decision making (children and young peoples voice in decision making). The main summary report seeks to highlight these interconnections and cross cutting themes.

Families and communities were formally identified as a priority focus for the evaluation of the ASF 2020-21 academic year (ASF Year 6 report). The enquiry yielded important insights into support and engagement with families and communities in the context of the ASF, such as the important role of family learning and family outreach work such as family link workers and associated teams, and the importance of effective links with wider partners both in the public and third sector.^[2] This is explored in further detail below.

The focus in ASF Year 6 (2020/21) evaluation informed the development of the sub-evaluation questions related to Evaluation Question 8. Two of the sub-questions were utilised in the previous evaluation and therefore are a direct continuation of these areas of focus.

The third sub-question related to the views of wider stakeholders reflects the greater focus on views of children, young people, families and communities, and third sector organisations across the evaluation in the new Evaluation Strategy. In this case with regard to approaches to engaging with and supporting families and communities. This is a key link across to the thematic evaluation strand children and young peoples voice in decision making.