al R e v ie w 2 014
Covering Play
Annu
situation solution benefit outcome impact
Chairperson’s Report
This is my final report as Chair of PlayBoard. With your indulgence I will take this time to reflect on the last 6 years which leaves me feeling so privileged to have been part of an organisation that is to the forefront of advancing the play agenda. Back in 2009, I joined the Board as the Executive at Stormont signed off on the Play and Leisure Policy statement. Then PlayBoard secured funding from Atlantic Philanthropies that enabled us to launch our innovative Advocacy work programme. From this exciting inaugural year PlayBoard has continued to grow and in 2010 we celebrated our 25th birthday with the move from our traditional home in York Street to Crescent Gardens. In true PlayBoard style we did not miss the opportunity to celebrate our birthday as we launched our first manifesto for Play in the Long Gallery at Stormont. We felt really proud of our sector as we brought the play agenda to the heart of government.
Securing Play a future for
In 2011 we achieved the IIP standard and the Play and Leisure Implementation Plan secured Stormont Executive endorsement. These added a few more building blocks towards securing a future for Play. The following year saw our work on advancing the play agenda receive another boost as the Minimum Standards for the registration and inspection of childcare services identified Playwork as the most appropriate qualification for School Age Childcare.
During 2013, and coinciding with our Annual Conference, the Junior Ministers announced a £1.6m investment in Play and Leisure. Then Play was designated as the Stormont Executive’s 7th signature project under the Delivering Social Change agenda. Most significantly in this year we also had the UNCRC launch the General Comment on Article 31, GC17. What a year! Furthermore we were extremely proud when our team of young researchers developed an easy-tounderstand version of GC17 for us adults to read. As I reflect on the past year, I am pleased to see that OFMDFM have established a programme board to oversee delivery on the Delivering Social Change play and leisure programme. PlayBoard is strategically placed in a key advisory role within this process and therefore able to influence any strategic decisions. I am sure there will be more challenges ahead for PlayBoard and our sector, but I am confident that the staff and Board will continue to work to secure a positive future for Play in Northern Ireland. To ALL the staff and Board of PlayBoard, for whom I have had the privilege to be your Chair, I would like to record a very warm and sincere thank you for making my time with the organisation such a pleasurable and rewarding period in my life. As a parent and grandparent I have learnt so much about the value of Play through my involvement with PlayBoard and it is with a heavy heart I sign off my last Chair’s report but with a confidence that PlayBoard will continue to build and work at securing play for the children and young people that we serve. Sam McCready Chair
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Chief Executive Officer’s Report I am pleased to present to you our 2013/2014 Annual Report in what has been another busy and successful year. The diversity of our work strands combine to support and strengthen our core rights based advocacy message for play. Participation and partnership working has resulted in a lot of mutual co-operation. Our research and evaluation agenda has enhanced the evidence base for play; consequently this has strengthened our membership voice. Over the last year we have engaged with and gathered the views of our member’s on an array of strategic social policy areas to collectively drive the play agenda. No more prevalent was this, than when it came to the players themselves. Children and young people’s views, aspirations and perception of themselves and the environment in which they live are at the very heart of PlayBoard’s work. Over the last year the work of our team of young researchers has stimulated interest amongst Ministers, Children’s Champions and Senior Departmental officials alike. At an international level, the young researcher’s efforts regarding the dissemination of General Comment 17 resulted in PlayBoard being invited to provide written and oral evidence to a number of Executive Committees regarding the input of the young researcher’s findings to the ‘Let us PLAY’ campaign. Their work was further showcased in Geneva at the official launch of General Comment no. 17 on UNCRC Article 31.
I am very proud and excited by the success of our young researcher’s and I look forward to working with them as they progress a number of new initiatives. This leads me to reflect on the excellence and commitment of the team that I have the great pleasure of working with. My deepest appreciation and thanks must go to the PlayBoard team, Staff and Board members alike, it is my absolute joy and pleasure to work with such passionate and committed people. I would like to say a special thank you, respectively to Sam McCready and Suzie Gray our Chair and Vice-Chair whose long term as honorary officers comes to an end. Thank you for your friendship, wise counsel, leadership and support over the years. Heading into the next reporting period, despite a challenging economic back drop, I look forward to working with our Board, and our new honorary officer team as they confidently drive forward the next phase of PlayBoard’s unfolding journey. I hope you join us for at least part of the route. I hope you find the presentation of this year’s report both informative and interesting. Yours Playfully, Jacqueline O’Loughlin Chief Executive Officer
Year highlights included: • A £1.6m investment in Play and Leisure through the Delivering Social Change framework. • Play and Leisure designated as the Executive’s 7th Delivering Social Change Signature programme. • A call for 7000 new school age childcare places via Bright Start’s first key actions. • Presenting our Young Researcher’s work at the official launch of General Comment no.17 in Geneva headquarters of the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child.
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Advocacy Advocating for the child’s right to play (article 31 of the UNCRC)
We campaign to ensure all children have the right to play because play is a fundamental aspect of childhood. Through our advocacy work we help those who make decisions to understand how and why play supports and delivers on their outcomes. We advocate for play for play’s sake, whilst recognising that there are many windfall benefits to the individual and society. Play, holistically supports learning, healthy development and wellbeing. We ask all policy makers and decision takers to recognise how central play is to children’s lives and their experience of childhood. This year we were delighted to see: • Play and Leisure designated as the seventh signature programme under the Delivering Social Change (DSC) framework. • The accompanying £1.6m investment for Play and Leisure. • Bright Start, identify a grant scheme to develop and sustain 7,000 School Age Childcare places. • Demand for Playwork growing across the region. • Widespread support and endorsement of our ‘Let us PLAY’ campaign. 4
£1e.s6tmm ent
s ha
Our presentations
• UK Draft Periodic Report to the UNCRC (DfE) • Delivering Social Change (OFMDFM) • Tax-Free Childcare (HMRC) • Rural Development Programme (DARD)
• Young Researchers Poster, GC17 launch, Geneva (Sept, 13) • Young Researchers, Advancing Children’s Rights, QUB (Jan 14) • CAN Play poster, Improving Children’s Lives, QUB (Feb 14) • No Compromise, Grantee Network, Belfast (Feb 14) • Play Symposium, Glasgow (12/13th Mar 14)
tin g fo r the
• Driving the Play Agenda Conference (8/9 Oct 13, 160 delegates) • 20/20 vision for childcare (20 Feb 14, 108 delegates) • General Comment 17 (17 Apr 13, 50 attendees)
• Playday 2013 (UK wide every August) • Stop demonising Young People (Belfast PCSP) • Goods, Facilities and Services (NICCY) • Lobby and Transparency Bill (NICVA) • Let us PLAY (PlayBoard)
lay.
Our events
Campaigning
ri g h t t op
• Children’s Play Policy Forum • Play Safety Forum • Policy sub-group (CiNI) • Children and Young People as Researchers • Child Poverty Alliance • All Party Group for Children and Young People • Child Rights Implementation Group • Bright Start stakeholder group • Regional Workforce group
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Our presence on policy forums
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Our consultation responses
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Meeting policymakers • Junior Ministers with responsibility for children and young people. • Departmental officials (OFMDFM, DARD, DHSSPS) • Key Party Policy Officers
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Participation Participation in Action We endeavour to achieve a society whereby “all people, however young are entitled to be participants in their own lives, to influence what happens to them, to be involved in creating their own environments, to exercise choices and to have their views respected and valued” (Lansdown 2005). Participation is about children and young people influencing decision-making that affects their lives and to achieve positive change for themselves and others. Participation is more than consultation; participation requires adults to adapt to be able to access children’s realities and to find that authentic voice, a voice not influenced by adult ideals, values and ways of doing things. Play is the ideal mechanism to achieve meaningful participation. PlayBoard is passionate about children and young people becoming strong, competent, social actors so that they can effectively participate in decisions that affect them, have their voices heard, valued and respected. We believe in children and young people having a say in making laws and policies, in designing and evaluating services and facilities that will affect them.
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This year we were delighted to have enabled participation to become more meaningful, particularly through the sterling work of our young researchers: • We developed and trained a group of children and young people to become peer researchers who have conducted their own research in relation to their right to play (General Comment 17, UNCRC). • Through participation we enabled children to have their say on a number of policy strategies including Towards a Childcare Strategy, Delivering Social Change and the UK Draft Periodic Report to the UNCRC.
Most children said they would like to ‘see less cars, traffic and safer roads’ (Young Researchers Report).
Right to Play Young researcher’s investigation on the right to play, General Comment 17:
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111 young people give their perceptions on their right to play
“change the waste ground into a big park”.
432
“cars are driving up and down my street”.
children have their say within policy consultations
“parking their cars on the footpath”.
“play on the street on different days”.
“Councils should close off roads”.
“more free events for children and parents to play”.
children and young people trained to become peer researchers
“I feel sad, angry and upset when I can’t play”.
“Less rubbish and more youth clubs”.
“We want more play in school”.
“Don’t have a safe place to play, it’s too far away”.
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Practice Playwork in Practice Playworkers view children and young people as competent individuals, they ensure that the play space is inclusive and they support all children to make the most of the available play opportunities whilst recognising that children need to encounter and create uncertainty and challenge as part of their play. A skilled and experienced playworker is capable of enriching the child’s play experience by providing the stimulus for new experiences. Playworkers act as a resource for children, whilst fostering a culture of exploration and creativity. Playwork occurs in many settings including: school age childcare services, schools, hospitals, play centres, holiday schemes, youth settings and local authority play schemes. As an organisation we are committed to promoting and professionalising playwork in Northern Ireland. To this end we continue to work strategically with partners, including SkillsActive our Sector Skills Council and the Playwork Education and Training Council for NI (PETCNI). This year, our face-to-face work with children modelled our child centred approach to working with children. Further, underpinned by a playwork methodology we continued to develop and grow the school age childcare sector. 8
Notable gains for playwork included: • Recognition as the most appropriate qualification for School Age Childcare settings in DHSSPS’s registration and inspection framework. • Playwork being prioritised on the Regional Early Year’s Workforce planning group. • Increased access and demand for playwork training and qualifications across the region. - Belfast Met offering Playwork qualification at levels 2 to 5. - Colleges and training providers now actively accessing and putting plans in place to addressing demand for playwork in their locality. • The launch of two new resource’s to assist Playwork practitioners – - Journey towards Inclusion and The Way to Play.
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125
Developing school age childcare services
Playwork Practice
Playwork Training Reflective Practice 60 attendees
This year
Outdoor Play 40 attendees
‘Positive PlayGrounds’ Programme 8 schools 124 teachers 136 children 20 parents
Behaviour Management 80 attendees
Face-to-face playwork
Play for Parents 92 parents 18 sessions ‘Membership Gatherings’ 84 attendees Understanding Play in SAC 20 Social workers attended Inclusion Training 60 attendees
Training
‘CAN Play’ 3 play areas 594 children 31 sessions
‘Improving Quality’ 13 settings 78 support visits
‘Intermediary Funding Body’ 160 claims processed
Nu r Pla turing yw ork
‘My Spaces’ 7 schools 155 P5s 42 sessions ‘Spaces to Be’ 5 schools 327 P5s & 6s
members
Developing playwork
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situation Advocacy
Participation
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Practice
Play, for its own sake is critical to childhood. Play is also critical to children’s learning and their healthy development. These realities are all too often forgotten or overlooked.
Children are the experts when it comes to play. Many adults fail to engage with children on decisions that affect them, thus denying them the right to exercise their voice and have their opinions taken into account.
Playwork is an emerging professional field with an increasingly well recognised and qualified workforce. In Northern Ireland recognition as well as the infrastructure for Playwork is still quite weak.
solution
benefit
Anchor the children’s policy discourse on a foundation of play. With play as the building block of childhood, it becomes a remit of education to prioritise play and to achieve better health outcomes. Children need to be healthy to be able to play.
Play for its own sake contributes to all aspects of learning; facilitates children’s capacities to negotiate, to regain their emotional balance, to resolve conflicts and make decisions. Play is fundamental to children’s health and well-being.
Empower children and young people to become strong, competent, social actors, so that they can effectively participate in decisions that affect them, have their voices heard, valued and respected.
Children gain a sense of purpose and an enhanced self-confidence and competence when their views and aspirations are given due consideration and weight. For society, the lives of the children, their families and wider community are also enhanced.
Increase the number of trained and qualified playworkers in Northern Ireland by establishing a strategic framework that promotes and supports the demand, development and attainment of playwork qualifications for play practitioners.
Access to qualifications, training and education for playworkers will improve play outcomes, experiences and opportunities for children and young people.
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outcome
impact
- £1.6m announced for Play and Leisure - Delivering Social Change - 7,000 School Age Childcare places - Bright Start - General Comment No. 17 is released by the UNCRC
For the play sector, the £1.6m investment is a potential game-changer. Likewise Bright Start’s commitment to School Age Childcare will build the sector’s infrastructure beyond recognition. And using General Comment 17 will impact on every aspect of play.
- 543 children have had a say on policy issues and decisions that affect them. - 10 children were trained to become peer researchers. - A suite of publications have been produced on making the right to play a reality in Northern Ireland.
We have empowered children to have a say on the issues that affect them. Their views are reflected in policy i.e. Delivering Social Change and Bright Start. Their voices have also informed PlayBoard’s ‘Let us PLAY’ campaign policy asks.
- Playwork recognised as the most appropriate qualifications for School Age Childcare settings (DHSSPS). - Playwork prioritised on Regional Early Year’s Workforce planning group - Increased access and demand for playwork training and qualifications.
Our delivery of programmes and training sessions to support play and playwork as well as the growing demand for Playwork qualification at levels 2 to 5 are together professionalising and developing the playwork workforce.
‘If teachers are willing to cast aside the shackles of planning, organisation and a knitted brow just for a while, the learning outcomes that can be achieved are kaleidoscopic. If PlayBoard were a ship, you would be a fool not to sail in it. Simply Jump on, shout “all aboard!” and let your class lead you in adventures unknown’ Year 4 Class teacher, Derry
IM PACT ‘Thank you PlayBoard for your continued guidance and support – such a valuable support’ Participant on our Membership Gathering, Enniskillen area.
‘This is giving us a great understanding of Minimum Standards and what is expected. It’s really focussed us on getting our policies up to date’ Project involved in the Southern Quality Improvement Programme, Southern Childcare Partnership area
State of Play No Continuing statutory belief in duty for fixed play play equipment
No regressive measures allowed (UN, 2013 – GC17)
Play Policy and Implementation Plan
‘Since we started to go this summer I had concerns that he would run off, be too rough with others, snatch etc. This project has shown me that he doesn’t need constant direction about how to play, he just needed the fun loving guidance of the amazing PlayBoard [playworkers]. I knew he was sociable but as his face lit up at the mention of PlayBoard I know he loves it and will miss it terribly’. Parent on CAN Play programme, Carrickfergus, Antrim, Newtownabbey Council Areas
£1.6m investment secured
Barriers
Enablers Views of children and young people not given due weight
General Comment 17 (GC 17)
School Age Childcare Grant Scheme 13
Treasurer’s Report. In these times of increasing financial hardship it is pleasing to be able to report on a healthy balance sheet at the end of the financial year. In preparing these financial statements, consistent accounting policies have been applied and the methods and principles in the Charities SORP adhered to. Much progress has been achieved despite the ad hoc nature of the current funding arena. With this challenge ongoing and the reality of material cuts in this current year the test of innovation and creativity remains fixed within our strategy.
Finance
£
Results
£ £
Given the talents within the PlayBoard team the Board of Directors are confident that tests, both current and future will be met. PlayBoard will continue to drive the Play Agenda, promoting the benefits of children’s play to ensure the development of the child. I would like to take this opportunity to thank Jimmy Gillen the Director of Corporate Services and Finance and Mairead McLaughlin our Finance Officer for their attention to detail, financial probity and professionalism. As Treasurer and a Trustee I am pleased to report that proper books of account have been kept, any risks mitigated and that the assets of PlayBoard are being safeguarded. JL Grant Chartered Certified Accountants have signed off the Year to March 14, with a clean bill of health and have commended us on our latest accounts showing we are operating as a viable, financially stable company. This year will I am sure present more challenges. In meeting those challenges we have in place a strong Board of Directors and staff team implementing a robust strategy that can be altered to account for unforeseen eventualities. Ian McAvoy Treasurer A full set of accounts can be downloaded at www.playboard.org 14
Income Generated 3Signed up to good Governance 3
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Membership 1%
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Play Advocacy 18%
Income
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Play Development 24%
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2012 Building Relations Through Play 28%
Activity of Expenditure
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31% 27% at
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2013
2014
Income up by 18% on previous year
Representation
125
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22% 20%
B ui R
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+ 18 %
Play Training 22%
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Other 7%
Members
40
After Schools Providers
10x
1500 followers @playboard_
500
likes on Facebook
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Staff PlayBoard Board of Directors Sam McCready Suzi Gray Ian McAvoy Jacqueline O’Loughlin Steve Daniels Peter McCartney Maura McCusker Anne McDermott Brenda Stevenson Gary Young Una Murphy Marilyn Warren
(tenure finished October 2013) (tenure finished October 2013)
PlayBoard Staff Jacqueline O’Loughlin Jimmy Gillen Alan Herron Angela Stallard Margaret Deevy Gillian McClay Laura McQuade Susan Kehoe Lisa O’Connor Mairead McLaughlin Frances Walsh Shauneen McCusker Aiveen Kavanagh Julie Cowan Pauline Murray Joan Noade Joanne Magee Caroline McCracken Grainne Daly
Chief Executive Officer Director of Corporate Services & Finance Director of Service Delivery & Development Regional Childcare Manager School Age Childcare Workforce Development Manager Programme Manager Senior Research Officer Senior Advocacy Officer Communications/Membership Officer Finance Officer Training & Development Officer Play Development Officer Play Development Officer Play Development Officer Project Officer Play Development Officer Play Development Officer Play Development Officer Play Development Officer (left September 2013)
Chairperson Vice Chair Treasurer Secretary
PlayBoard wish to acknowledge and recognise the contribution of our former colleagues and Board Members who left during the year 2013/14
RAS
Solutions
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We’re Putting the BOUNCE into Play
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PlayBoard NI 7 Crescent Gardens Belfast BT7 1NS Northern Ireland T: 028 9080 3380 F: 028 9080 3381 E: info@playboard.co.uk
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