Translations are computer generated
Home-Start Oxford Annual Report
Welcome to our 33rd Annual Report, 2020-21
Katharine Barber, CEO of Home-Start Oxford introduces our Annual Report.
Translations are computer generated
Home-Start Oxford Annual Report
Welcome to our 33rd Annual Report, 2020-21
Katharine Barber, CEO of Home-Start Oxford introduces our Annual Report.
Our work in numbers
“Aline was there with us when we were on a really tough road. I can really see the difference between now and then.”
A mum at the end of support from Aline, Family Support Worker at Home-Start Oxford
Our lockdown response
Although it’s too early to know the full long-term impact of lockdown, it is set to cast a long shadow.
We are already seeing the significant impact of the pandemic on young families.
Many parents are suffering from increased anxiety and isolation and feel that it’s now more difficult to access vital information and support.
Parents have been deprived of opportunities to share experiences, get out of the house and connect with other adults. They have felt angry, lost and frustrated by the closure of toddler groups and redeployment of health visitors. Many new parents have suffered increased birth trauma and isolation, as a result of Covid.
At Home-Start Oxford we have been there for families to mitigate anxieties. Our volunteers have provided comfort, reassurance and a human connection to many families feeling trapped at home.
Our online groups have enabled parents to connect, access information and perhaps most importantly feel noticed and welcomed. Through these groups we have engaged with many hard-to-reach families who would not have usually accessed support, and through funded devices and data we’ve helped those affected by the digital divide get online.
For many families the support from volunteers and online groups provided the only external interaction that they and their babies or young children had during lockdown.
During the pandemic and beyond we will be there for parents when they need us most. We will help give children the best possible start in life by supporting parents as they grow in confidence, strengthen their relationships with their children and widen their links with the local community.
Overcoming isolation: Sarah’s story
Sarah* became a new mum during lockdown. Having existing struggles with mental health illness, and a history of self-harm, baby Sam’s* traumatic birth exacerbated her anxiety.
With no local family or friends, and a partner working long hours and dealing with mental health challenges of his own, Sarah felt really isolated and depressed. Her anxiety manifested into intrusive thoughts and she found it impossible to leave the house alone due to fears about things like crossing the road with her buggy.
Sarah’s Home-Start coordinator, Kate*, has built a relationship with her, and supported her to join online groups and buggy walks. By going along to groups with her, and supporting her on the phone, Kate has helped reduce her anxiety and build her confidence and independence. Kate has also supported her in considering talking therapies and helped her research childcare options.
Sarah’s relationship with Kate means that she feels able to talk openly and honestly about how she’s feeling, and she knows that she can reach out when she’s not feeling able to cope.
Knowing how important the early experiences are for Sam, she’s determined not to let her own mental health issues get in the way. Seeing Sam have his first interactions with other children has encouraged her to work through the tough challenges she faces.
Sarah is a committed and dedicated parent, and thanks to support from Home-Start Oxford she now feels better able to be the parent that she wants to be.
(*Names have been changed to protect privacy.)
“I’m so pleased you called. I feel absolutely elated. It has made such a difference to talk to an adult and know that there are people out there who care.”
A parent receiving support from Home-Start Oxford
“Having these online sessions has really helped me to feel less isolated as a new mum and being in lockdown.”
A mum who attended our online groups
Growing Minds
Delivering our partnership project, ‘Growing Minds’, in Littlemore (which aims to improve ‘school readiness’ for all families with a new baby), was a challenge during the pandemic.
The difficulty was building trust and engagement with parents online – and food proved to be the answer!
As an extension of the original project, ‘Play:Full’ (a collaboration with Good Food Oxford) aimed to raise awareness of the opportunities to share home learning experiences with children through cooking, food, and mealtimes.
While meeting a real practical need, delivering a bag of ingredients each week enabled our Coordinator to have valuable doorstep conversations helping relationships and trust to flourish.
Assisted by her own children, our Coordinator made a family meal and shared a recipe video weekly. This was to support parents who may find it challenging to follow the recipe card, and also to highlight hygiene tips, and to role model how children could be involved safely.
Many of the families involved (that included those affected by poor mental-health, childhood trauma, isolation, and learning difficulties) had negative perceptions of ‘outside help’ and receiving support. This can cause reluctance to engage but the way this project was delivered created a peer-support culture. Parents connected via Zoom and WhatsApp groups in order to support each other and share their struggles with a great focus on our #RealLifeParenting ethos.
The project encouraged parents to participate in more activities with their children, helped them better understand the value of the home-learning environment, and increased confidence in the kitchen, understanding of nutrition, and skills for budgeting.
“My confidence has really increased being part of the group. I look forward to it every week”
A mum who participated in the Play:full project
Other highlights
The ‘Heart of Home-Start’
Our team of volunteers are a group of dedicated individuals without whom our service wouldn’t operate, and we are truly grateful for their commitment. During 2020-21 we continued to focus on enabling people to grow with Home-Start and provided enhanced volunteer training, including sessions on ‘Perinatal & Infant Mental Health’, the ‘Peep Learning Together Programme’ and ‘Attachment Theory’ by OXPIP.
We are pleased to have seen a surge in volunteering enquiries due to the pandemic and our enhanced digital presence, and were thrilled to recruit one of our new volunteers, Charlie, into the staff team as a Family Coordinator.
“Thank-you for the absolutely fantastic course; very interesting and well presented; the fact that you have the wider knowledge and ability to talk around the topics makes it far easier to absorb the information and so much more enjoyable to listen to.”
A Home-Start Oxford volunteer
Digital upgrade
We launched a new website and supercharged our social media, dramatically enhancing our presence online. Linked with this we launched new online referral forms which make it much easier for families and professionals to reach out for support.
Oxfordshire Early Years Network
We allied with a partner charity, Viva Doorsteps, to create the Oxfordshire Early Years Network to provide peer support, a platform to share expertise, and respond to changing needs. The network has 150 members, and has helped us amplify the needs of families in the Early Years to the Local Authority and other key players.
‘Give A Little Love’
An ongoing national partnership between Home-Start, and John Lewis and Waitrose has been invaluable in attracting funding and raising awareness of the support that we provide to families finding things tough.
Finances
• Substantial rise in total income from 2019-20 (48%), largely as a result of Oxfordshire Community Foundation’s funding of two new projects (Growing Minds & Step Change), a full year’s funding for our BBC Children in Need Project, a legacy of £15,000 and increased restricted grants from a number of charitable trusts.
• In line with our Strategy, we are laying the foundations for a major change in size and an increased ability to provide support to local families. The pandemic has delayed progress, restricting our ability to recruit new staff, and deliver new projects during 2020-21.
• We are now faced with the continuing challenge of making this higher level of income sustainable to ensure we are able to meet the continually growing need, which has been heightened by the pandemic.
• Since the end of the financial year, we have recruited more family support staff, with further appointments pending, and are developing collaborative projects for delivery in 2021-22.
• Our year-end reserves are strong at 90% of the year’s expenses which will provide some security against expected future financial uncertainty. However, we anticipate an increase in expenses as we gradually begin to ‘return to normal’, and some volatility in income as community need remains high and competition for funds is greater.
Strategy Update
How we’re progressing on our strategic plan for 2020-2022
At the end of 2019 we created an ambitious vison and strategy to grow Home-Start Oxford to fulfil unmet needs in our community.
Covid may have altered our plans but we haven’t taken our eye off our long term vision which is built around four key planks;
- Expand our service
- Increase specialist support
- Build a more diverse, and inter-connected community
- Increase our profile
We are as ambitious now as we were when we developed our vision and strategy, and are in a great position to deliver it.
During the year 20-21 we reached many new families through social media and online groups, offered specialist support through online sessions, became better connected with our community and sector, and built our profile with the Home-Start Oxfordshire branded bus and our supercharged presence online.
Since the end of that year we have continued to work on delivering our strategy; recruiting new staff – notably an Inclusion Coordinator, developing dedicated support for dads, and the planned launch of family groups in Oxford.
Looking ahead
We look forward to moving on from the challenges of the past 18 months, but will keep some of the new approaches and methods we’ve developed which have helped us engage with many of the most hard to reach families.
We will continue to support local families using our preventative, early intervention approach, in order to make sure that all parents have the support that they need to give their children the best start in life.
We will be there for parents when they need us most – because childhood can’t wait.
Thank you
We would like to say a huge THANK YOU to all our volunteers.
They are at the heart of our service and we cannot praise them highly enough.
Heartfelt thanks to the many churches and schools, trusts and foundations, Oxford colleges and companies, individuals and anonymous donors who have supported us during the year.
With thanks to our wonderful supporters, including…
