Scottish Mentoring and Leadership Programme: interim report - qualitative process and impact assessment

Footnotes

1 Children's social work statistics 2022-23 - looked after children (This is down 15.6% from July 2020 when there were 14,458 Looked After children and when plans for the SMLP were first developed: Children's social work statistics 2020-21)

2 Throughout this report, we use ‘programme’ when referring to the Scottish Mentoring and Leadership Programme as a whole. When referring specifically to the either of the two strands (i.e. MCR Pathways and the Columba 1400 Young People’s Leadership Academy) we have referred to these by name, or as the ‘intervention’ or ‘scheme’ where it is already clear which is being discussed.

3 Independent Care Review - the plan

4 MCR Pathways Social Bridging Finance Initiative for Educational Outcomes Evaluation Report

5 The original model was to fund 50% of the cost of MCR for each participating school for three years, which was then ‘matched’ by the local authority or school who provided the school-based co-ordinator. After this period, the local authority/school would be expected to fund the intervention in full on the basis of evidence of impact. The full cost of running a YPLA is £30,000 and schools would receive funding to cover two-thirds of this. Note that the funding went to MCR and C1400 and not directly to the local authority/school.

6 MCR Pathways home page

7 This may vary when a school first joins the MCR. For example, those already in S2 when the school joins will not have group work in S1 and those in S3 and above may be matched with a mentor without having done the group work. In some cases, pupils are matched with a mentor in S2 if there is a high enough need for support.

8 Columba 1400 Young People's Leadership Academy web page

9 The impact on ‘hard’ outcomes will be assessed for MCR Pathways only as it would not be possible to construct a robust control group for the Columba 1400 YPLA.

10Again, this will be assessed for MCR Pathways only as Value for Money analysis requires robust data on ‘hard’ outcomes.

11 See Intervention Overviews Columba 1400 section of this report for a description of the residential and other elements of Columba 1400.

12 Percentage of pupils living in 20% most deprived areas (according to the Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation (SIMD)), where SIMD status had been added to the MCR reporting system. For more details of SIMD see here: Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation 2020 web page

13 Where free school meal registration had been added to the MCR reporting system. There are likely to be other young people who are entitled but not registered.

14 Where additional support needs had been added to the MCR reporting system.

15 Where relevant data had been added to the MCR reporting system.

16 Note that this particular requirement no longer exists in the MCR model.

17 The evaluation will quantify the impact of the programme as a whole, and may be able to identify differences in impact between those who received group work as well as mentoring and those who only received mentoring. However, it will not be able to assess the impact of the group work alone.

18 In these instances, MCR have run ‘mentor prep’ sessions - small cluster support sessions for pupils.

19 MCR have a partnership agreement with DYW and have recently signed a strategic partnership agreement with SDS.

20 Career Ready targets young people from economically impoverished and social mobility challenged backgrounds.

21 The amount allocated to each school is based on the number of free school meal registrations.

22 Video calls were introduced during the COVID-19 pandemic but Columba 1400 are aiming to return to face-to-face delivery for all schools.

23 This approach was not included in the current evaluation because it was at too early a stage.

24 Research by the Training & Employment Research Unit, University of Glasgow (commissioned by Columba 1400, with reporting in 2015) suggested, on the basis of a follow-up survey with young people, that perceived impacts for young people could be longer-lasting, beyond the point of leaving school, although small sample sizes limit the robustness of this evidence. (The report is not publicly available but has been seen by the authors).

25 This approach was not included in the current evaluation because it was at too early a stage.