Homes2Inspire Final Report - April 2024

Prospects, Homes2Inspire, and Northamptonshire Children’s Trust formed a partnership leading to a project that embeds a Health and Wellbeing Officer into the support available in the Children’s Home, alongside existing Children’s Home Staff1. This role seeks to provide two key benefits. First, the Health and Wellbeing Officer is expected to improve children and young people's mental health and wellbeing, and second, in doing this, it is believed to have an impact on the ability of staff to develop a meaningful and stable relationship with children and young people, improve children and young people’s health and wellbeing, and also to improve staff’ wellbeing and job satisfaction. The purpose of this research is to investigate if the above mentioned changes have occurred with the introduction of the Health and Wellbeing Officer.

To evaluate the programme both quantitative and qualitative data were collected from April 2023 to January 2024. The quantitative data presented in this report were gathered through an online questionnaire that captured the responses of staff. In total, 38 questionnaires were collected (29 at the beginning and nine at the end of the evaluation) with a focus on the Homes2Inspire environment, their wellbeing, and their job engagement. The qualitative data collection consisted of six interviews with staff members, a case study with one young person, and quotations from staff provided by Homes2Inspire. Moreover, social impact figures were shared by Homes2Inspire to allow for comparisons from 2022 to 2023. Overall, the introduction of the Health and Wellbeing Officer had an impact on several aspects of the programme. Homes2Inspire provides support for children and young people by increasing their wellbeing, self-confidence, and autonomy. The integration of the Health and Wellbeing Officer had a positive impact on the managers and the staff members who can now confide in support in helping the children and young people's development. Moreover, the integration of the Health and Wellbeing Officer has had a demonstratable social impact for 2022 and 2023, with an overall social impact of £495,236.47.