We have just put a bid in for some work on an interesting Children's Centre. It is thinking hard about what it does and how well it does it and how it can demonstrate its impact. This is not easy, but well worth doing in these uncertain times. It made us think about the mantra of evidence based policy that the previous government came to power with. It always meant two things to us: 1) Is the literal one: let's do things that we can prove will work; 2) We are not ideologically driven one; we are not carelessly spending loads of cash doing this because we are lefty loonies.
When it comes to early years intervention the evidence is clear that getting things right then is crucial to life chances. A good society should prioritise efforts for that reason alone, but there seems to be a need to make it more complicated than that, we want to know our money is being well spent, we are getting best value and so on. The desire for answers to these questions creates endless data, but does it prove anything? Evidence based policy is much easier to use to bring something to a halt, than prove it should be continued, especially when it is to do with something where it can take 20 years to really know if policy has had an impact. For example, health inequalities have persisted in the presence of Sure Start, so can the Comprehensive Spending Review cut funding to them with a clear conscience?
If we are successful, with the bid we will look forward to working with this innovative Centre to make a case for their importance.
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Reply #2 on : Thu January 26, 2012, 17:40:24
Posts: 2
Reply #1 on : Sat February 12, 2011, 12:26:43
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