Swansea See More Than Just The Statistics

For many Youth Offending Teams, pulling out the numbers to send in returns to the YJB is simply another task to tick off the list. But for Swansea YOT, the information and statistics they gather for these returns are used to do much more than simply report back.

With innovative use of the wizards and tables already set up to help with these returns in Social Software’s YOIS (Youth Offending Information System), they have been able to evidence their improvement, identify areas to target and, importantly, to keep their team motivated and doing the best they can to help the young people they work with.

Swansea YOT see in the region of 500 young people every year, covering the full spectrum from those initially identified as ‘at risk’ through to those already involved in the later stages of offending. The last 5 years have seen their number of persistent young offenders more than halve, leaving much of their current work centred around the early intervention stages and a developing prevention initiative.

Information and Data Protection Manager Heather Burnside, ensures that the YOT remains at the forefront of recording, case management and information use with the help of Social Software’s YOIS.

One of the key benefits of YOIS for the YOT is that it enables them to make the best use of data they gather. As Heather explains, ‘it means that we’re not just recording data for it’s own sake, or simply to pull out the required statistics; we can easily draw out and format the data to evidence our work and to get information about what is really going on in the lives of the young people we work with’.

One example of using the data in a more in-depth way came from looking in more detail at the problem of shoplifting in Swansea. The YOT knew that this was a problem in the area but in order to best address this issue, the team wanted to know more details about the nature of these offences and the type of young people committing them.

Using YOIS Heather was able to pull out information on the age, gender, and other demographics of the young people involved in the shoplifting offences. The information indicated clearly that there seemed to be a sharp increase in shoplifting among girls around the age of first starting at secondary school. Armed with this information the team have been able to focus on that age group, informing the schools and going in to help them best address the problem.

Swansea have also found that they can be innovative with their use of the reports and wizards designed for producing YJB returns in YOIS. This has enabled them to quickly and easily pull together information for other uses as well. ‘Using the same Table Wizards and the same information as for the YJB returns, we pull out the actual numbers (not just percentages) for our Local Performance Measures,’ explains Heather. ‘I can then paste these into a spreadsheet and pull out graphs and tables which help us identify, at a glance, how we are doing.’

These numbers and charts are used by the management in planning at their steering groups, as well as providing an overview of the YOT’s progress for any external agencies requesting information and helping YOT staff see where there is room for improvement and where they are doing well.

Following a low score on the last YJB returns, many of the YOT’s staff were disheartened, feeling that the work they were doing wasn’t making as much of a difference as they felt it should. However, by looking at the actual numbers in more detail, Heather was able to illustrate to the team how the results came about and show them that they were still making a difference; identifying where there was good progress and where improvements could be made.

As Heather says, ‘with the majority of the work already done for completing the required returns, a little extra work goes a long way and really does help the team.’

Looking to the future, Heather would like to develop the use of Social Software’s UMIS within the YOT, so that they reach the same levels of data recording and analysis in prevention as they have achieved in offending.

And in regularly meeting with all the Welsh Information Managers to discuss the current issues, she and her colleagues are sure to continue to make real improvements to the way information is used and to the impact that has on service delivery and outcomes for young people.