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Good Practice







Other
Policies and procedures
High-level commitment
Measuring impact
Management information and records of volunteers
Working with clients
Quality standards
Disseminating Good Practice to other organisations

Policies and procedures

01 Volunteer Centre Westminster: CRB Policies

Due to the nature of some of the volunteer roles, rigorous risk assessment has identified the need for (Criminal Record Bureau) CRB checks in some areas. The Centre became a CRB Umbrella body in 2004 and has since developed policies and procedures that are used both internally and also as examples of good practice in training courses for other organisations. This includes material relating to recruitment and selection and involving those with learning difficulties.

The Volunteer Centre Westminster policy on the recruitment of ex-offenders into roles involving Vulnerable Clients indicates that at interview, or in a separate discussion, the Centre will ensure that an open and measured discussion takes place on the subject of any offences or other matter that might be relevant to the position.

The policy makes it clear that having a criminal record will not necessarily bar applicants from working with the Centre, but this will depend upon the nature of the position and the circumstances and the background of offences involved.

As part of the recruitment/appointment process, Volunteer Centre Westminster will consider:

The above policy is used in conjunction with the:

02 Volunteer Centre Sutton: Moving Volunteer Managers towards good pracrtice

Volunteer Centre Sutton aims to provide support and guidance to move volunteer managers towards good practice by providing model policies, procedures, practices and training to enable them to provide better support for their volunteers Consequently groups can enhance recruitment and retention, particularly in relation to volunteers at risk from social exclusion.

Policies and procedures maintained by Volunteer Centre Sutton include:

03 Cheetham Hill Advice Centre: Clear Policies

The organisation has in place a range of clear policies. These include:

04 CAN Footsteps: Footsteps Procedures Manual

The Footsteps procedures manual sets out clear procedures for six stages of mentee support. These can be summarised as follows:

Stage one - Referral Procedure: The referral procedure begins when either an agency or an individual contacts Footsteps with a view to referring that individual. First contact is usually by telephone. In any case, an eligibility test is undertaken before referral is taken any further.

Stage two – Application Procedure: This covers the initial assessment interview, the Footsteps Introduction Document and completion of the application form and accompanying procedures.

Stage three – Allocation Procedure: This stage covers the mentoring service level required, signposting where appropriate and the mentor and mentee matching process.

There are three main areas of consideration in relation to mentoring service level required:

There may be cases where Mentoring and Befriending is not a suitable option for the individual. In such circumstances Footsteps can act purely in a signposting capacity

Once the need for a mentor, and the type and level of service required has been established, the Project Co-coordinator must match the mentee with a mentor. Footsteps Mentor Matching Guidelines outline this process.

Stage four – Initiation procedure : Should the match between mentee and mentor be successful a second meeting will be arranged between the two, with the agenda for this meeting broken down into five stages; Schedule Agreement; Formalising Agreeements; IDP Commencement; Mentee Induction and Mentee Assessment

Stage five: The Mentoring procedure: The Procedures Manual sets out the guidelines that should be observed and processes that should be adhered to during the mentoring process

Stage six: Exit Procedure: There are three main ways in which the Exit Stage may be reached:

In all three cases exit interviews are required, together with associated procedures.

05 Manchester Event Volunteers (MEV): Code of Practice

MEV has developed a Code of Practice for working with clients, which sets out responsibilities to volunteers and guidelines in relation to the selection, management and training of volunteers. This requires the signed agreement of the client.

MEV has maintained a high level of commitment from the volunteers by providing a supportive environment. Two members of the team have been in post since 2002 and know the majority of volunteers personally. The Code of Practice highlights the responsibility that event organisers have for the support and supervision of volunteers during events. Feedback from events and training is actively encouraged and volunteers are asked to complete evaluation forms following each activity either on line or in written form.

A member of the MEV team meets with event organisers prior to an event to explain MEV’s code of Practice and obtain signed agreement. Event organisers are made fully aware of their responsibilities to the volunteers and are provided with guidelines regarding the selection management and training responsibilities for volunteers which include responsibility for identifying tasks/roles, conducting briefing sessions prior to events to ensure volunteers have a clear understanding of their roles and event organisers have responsibility for conducting CRB checks as appropriate. The MEV team will screen the volunteers prior to the event to identify volunteer suitability for specific tasks and will liase with the event organiser and volunteer to address any issues that arise. Mark Pritchard, the manager of MEV, highlighted the approach towards implementing the Code of Conduct :

“Before we advertise anything either on the website or the newsletter we actually meet with the event organisers. We go out personally and meet them either in their place of work if it is a long-term opportunity or where the event is going to be held. We will run through everything with them – the health and safety responsibilities, accident book, reporting procedures, etc. We explore whether there is scope for the roles to be adapted to suit people with mobility issues or who are disabled. We also look at the fact that some of the volunteers will be unemployed and how they are going to be paid their fares, etc. We ensure that everything in the code of practice is discussed with the event organiser beforehand so everyone is aware of what is required”

The Code of Conduct specifically covers:

06 Hull Community & Voluntary Service: Compact Volunteering Guide

The Volunteer Centre has taken the lead role in developing the Compact Volunteering Code of Practice within the local Compact, consulting with volunteer involving organisations in the voluntary and public sectors.

All literature is designed to include people from the widest variety of backgrounds and abilities, with literature in other languages and formats to suit different needs.

The compact for Hull is an agreement intended to provide a framework for developing effective relationships between the public and voluntary and community sectors in the city of Hull. Its objective is to create a level playing field and ensure that services are delivered in the best way possible and to the needs of local people.

As part of that process, the Compact sets out the key principles and undertakings, which will underpin the relationship between the public and voluntary and community sectors in the city of Hull.

The Compact has been drawn up in partnership, following extensive consultation between the public and voluntary and community sectors in Hull. The Compact is deliberately not exhaustive, but recognises the diversity of the voluntary and community sector and its activities. It is both a general framework and an enabling mechanism that enhances the relationship between the public and voluntary and community sectors.

The Compact has been supported by five codes of practice, covering:

All of these codes, within the principle of the Compact, have a commitment to equality and diversity.

The Volunteering Code of Practice sets out the key principles and undertakings of the Voluntary/Community and Public sectors in Hull on good practice in volunteering. This code reflects a shared Compact vision for the voluntary, community and public sectors in Hull to work together in developing and supporting volunteering in Hull.

The aims of the Volunteering Code of Good Practice are:

High-level commitment

01 Bolton Lads and Girls Club: Long term strategy and funding plan

The project has established a very good reputation and credibility within the town, built on commitment to the provision of personal development opportunities for young people and agreement of a long-term strategy and funding plan. This includes provision of a new £4.5 million building. Karen Edwards, the Mentoring Project Manager at Bolton Lads and Girls Club highlighted the position of the Club within the Bolton community:

“People want to volunteer with Bolton lads and Girls Club because of the history, because of the credibility within the town. Everybody knows about it, everybody is familiar with it. We have been using volunteers for over a hundred years. There is an attraction to being part of the organisation”.

Bolton Lads & Girls Club was established in 1889 to provide a safe, leisure time for young lads, especially those working in the local mills. The idea was an instant success and the club continued to grow and grow, always providing new positive opportunities for young lads. Girls were also allowed into the club in 1991, and progression continued through the years, to prove that positive outlooks resulted from activities and a place to go with friends – far better than hanging out on the streets. Young people could begin to fulfil their potential, develop self-esteem and start on the road to becoming responsible citizens.

It was eventually recognised that the club could be stretched no further! New premises were desperately required and funds had to be raised and after immense efforts by many people, inside and outside the club, it was possible to build a brand new Bolton Lads & Girls Club.

The Sport England Lottery saw the potential for the club to expand and donated £4 million and the club itself, including staff, patrons, members and businesses raised £1.1 million.

The new club opened in 2002 with fantastic facilities including :

There are now over 2500 children and young people utilising the clubs facilities and activities each week.

Measuring Impact

01 The Junction: Assessing impacts

The approach to assessing the impact of the Project takes account of the value of an impartial view. The Project uses external consultants to measure impact, plus group evaluation sessions.

The Junction regularly uses external consultants to review and evaluate their work with all relevant stakeholders. Recently the Junction underwent an external evaluation of the Odyssey Project with school staff, young people, service users and staff and volunteers. The Junction internally evaluate all aspects of the project on an annual basis and have researched the impact of individual areas of work through outcomes research in The Junction’s Open Access service and reviewed the Young Carers Project with the young carers families.

The data produced from these evaluations is presented to the Management Committee and presented in our Annual Review. Areas for development are identified and the recommended actions are taken.

The Junction also carries out exit interviews when volunteers leave the project. This provides the Project with the information about which aspects of the project volunteers found helpful/ unhelpful. The information from these interviews is reported to the Personnel Sub Committee and helps staff to develop and improve the future volunteering experience at The Junction.

Although The Junction undertakes considerable evaluation activity, there is also the acceptance that there is a gap in evaluating impact by failing to seek the views of other agencies about their performance.

2 Chance UK: Measuring impact

Chance UK values the importance of measuring the impact the mentoring programme has on their children.

Children are referred to Chance UK by primary schools and, to a lesser extent, by social services and other agencies. Chance UK assesses their behaviour using Goodman Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ). A score of 16 or over indicates that a child has a behavioural difficulty and is suitable for the Chance UK programme (many score 30+). Other home and environmental factors will also be taken into consideration.

Once a child meets referral criteria, the child and his or her parent are visited at their home to carry out a further assessment. This gives an opportunity to answer any questions that they may have about Chance UK mentoring programme. Chance UK accepts a child on to the programme only when there is clear evidence of a willingness to participate on the part of the child and the parent.

Once a child has been accepted, s/he is matched with a volunteer mentor. The first three months is the bonding period between the mentor and child.

All children, with the support of their mentor set goals at three months into their mentoring year at a review. All relationships are closely supervised with a minimum of monthly face-to-face supervision with the mentor throughout the year. In supervision, ways of moving closer to the goals are suggested and tried out within the mentoring sessions.

After each child and mentor pair graduate, Chance UK staff conduct debriefs with all parties involved so that the progress of each child can be evaluated. These debriefs take place with the referrer, child, mentor and parent and look at changes in relationships, behaviour and social development.

At this point the SDQ is revisited. The referrer’s original score from the SDQ shows whether a child is suitable for inclusion onto the programme. At the start the parent is also asked to complete the same questionnaire and then at the review stage the mentor completes yet another. This gives a broad base form which change can be measured. At the debriefs with all parties involved, the SDQ is completed again and gives a measurable indicator of a change in the child’s behaviour.

Based on this process, in 2005 45% of the children had no behavioural difficulties at the end of the programme, and 88% had a reduction in score.

Chance UK has identified funding for a longitudinal study of its’ work which will begin in October 2006. This work will be carried out by the Unit for School & Family Studies, Department of Psychology, Goldsmiths College and will identify five cases at the matching stage and follow them through the full year to debriefing; compile comparative data on starting and ending SDQ’s for all children completing the programme since December 2005, when the last evaluation was completed. The study will also identify 40 children who completed the programme in the last three years to see how changes have been maintained.

Chance UK has also introduced a self-esteem measure in October 2006. This questionnaire will be completed by the child at the beginning and end of the programme so that comparative data on self esteem can also be measured alongside the SDQ score.

 

03 Brighton Unemployed Centre Families Project, (BUCFP): Monitoring and Evaluation

Brighton Unemployed Centre Families Project, (BUCFP), is a user-run and managed project run by a team of trained volunteers supported by a part-time paid worker. The aim of the Project is relieve poverty, distress, and hardship among unemployed, poorly housed, and low-waged people and their families.

BUCFP has sought to ensure that its aims were being achieved through monitoring and evaluation activities. Wide-ranging methods of evaluation have been employed by Brighton Unemployed Centre Families Project to aid future planning and thus improve the quality of services including:

 

Furthermore collaboration with the University of Brighton will expand the work on evaluation to include:

04 CSV Volunteering Partners: Young People's Forum

CSV Volunteering Partners run the Yu-act Project with the aim of increasing the number of young people involved in volunteering in Luton and South Bedfordshire. It promotes volunteering as a fun way to get involved in something different, and introduces young people to volunteering, and encourages them to move on to other volunteering opportunities.

As with any volunteering activity, getting accurate feedback is crucial. The Yu-act Project has developed a good practice of Young People's Forums as an additional way to do this, and the main features are as follows:

 

 

05 North Tyneside Voluntary Organisations Development Agency, (VODA): Impact Assessment:

North Tyneside Voluntary Organisations Development Agency, (VODA), provides advice, training, information and support to voluntary organisations to promote the development of a borough-wide community rich in volunteers.

Measuring the impact of volunteering activity is important to inform the organisation about what it does, and also to support fundraising. VODA has developed a good practice around this concept, the main features of which are as follows:

06 Tynedale Voluntary Action, (TVA): Formal Evaluation

Tynedale Voluntary Action, (TVA), is a local volunteer centre with a mission to promote, enable, and develop volunteering throughout Tynedale, seeking to break down barriers and make volunteering accessible to all sections of the community. The project aims to overcome the effect of isolation and deprivation by working with community groups and individuals in collaboration with similar organisations and local partnerships, to realise social inclusion.

Volunteering Tynedale is committed to both internal and external project evaluation, incorporating both inputs and outcomes, as a key part of its on-going monitoring and assessment procedures. As a good practice this formal evaluation has the following main features:

 

 

06 Bankside Open Spaces Trust, (BOST): Evaluating Project Outcomes

Bankside Open Spaces Trust, (BOST), is a charity in north west Southwark that works to shape local concern into action for parks, gardens, and the wider shared environment. It promotes inclusive action to ensure that local needs are met for each green space in the area.

 

06 Poole Volunteer Centre: Project evaluation through an in-depth survey of volunteers

The Poole Volunteer Centre is a project of Poole CVS and runs the Older People’s Volunteer Project. The aim of the project is to involve more older people in Poole in volunteering, especially those who may face barriers to volunteering.

The Poole Volunteer Centre are utlising the Volunteering England Toolkit in order to undertake an indepth survey of volunteers.  Careful consideration has been given to the conduct of the survey, which will be:

 

Management information and records of volunteers

01 121 Youth Befriending: Computerised case records
121 Youth Befriending has set up a computerised case management systemthat all coordinators feed into and can access. This provides a more effective way for central monitoring, greater accountability and accessibility. The system includes:

Client name, contact details and date of birth

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Entry date

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Client status

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Referral reasons and comments

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Further notes on referral details and notes on client

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Details of agencies involved in referral

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Outcome after participation in project

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CRB check and personal reference details

The management system can generate a range of standard reports, including:

Other uses of ICT include using the website to begin the recruitment process for volunteers online, and the production of promotional DVDs.

121 Youth Befriending has a bespoke website with information relating to the Zero Project in four languages, other than English, these being Bengali, Punjabi, Urdu and Chinese.

02 Age Concern Gateshead: Embracing ICT

The Project brings a strategic approach to volunteering throughout the organisation, building on the volunteer related practices that have been developed and improved over the years, and to enhance the support and supervision of the volunteers. The project has also begun to embrace the use of ICT in its work. This is exemplified by the use of IT to analyse the profile of the volunteer body in order to assess diversity. The Project is also developing IT systems to record volunteer data in order to improve quality and timeliness in the generation of management information. The database is being used to identify long serving volunteers and provides the Project with information regarding diversity and educational qualifications. Such information can be useful in providing supporting evidence for funding applications. The database helps in providing up-to-date statistics for report writing. Ian Hutchinson, the Volunteer Co-ordinator at Gateshead Age Concern commented:

“Our database is fairly recent and we are now trying to analyse more and collect data. But based on what we have so far I would say that up to 60% of volunteers are coming in on word of mouth”


03 Bolton Lads and Girls Club: Comprehensive records of volunteers

Comprehensive records of volunteers are maintained through a database recording and management information system. This is a bespoke development based on a Microsoft Access platform.

The database system records all the information relating to the volunteer mentors. This includes personal information about all volunteers including when CRB checks are undertaken, reference checks, interviews and source of enquiry. The database then records all elements of each individual’s induction and training package and highlights sessions that the volunteers may have missed for whatever reason. As a volunteer mentor is matched with a young person this information is recorded on the database together with every meeting date the mentor has with their assigned young person. Every contact Bolton Lads and Girls Club have with the mentor is recorded, together with a brief overview of the conversation.

Bolton and Lads Girls Club can view at a glance all contact made with the mentor, how often they are meeting their mentee, what training they require and when their supervisions have occurred and are next due. The Project has demonstrated this database system to other mentoring providers, who have visited the project and they have been impressed with the high level of information, statistics and records kept. The database can then analyse information relating to the recruitment of volunteers, the numbers of mentors meeting their mentees in any particular week, how often a mentor attends training, any further information that may be required by the operational team, the Project Manager, the Club’s Board of Directors or the external funding organisations. The Project is also asked to provide in-depth information relating to the mentoring relationships to professional agencies such as social services and this system allows the Project to do this efficiently and accurately. Some of the information is used to measure how effective the Project’s recruitment campaigns are, the retention rates of the volunteer workforce, the ethnicity and make up of the volunteers, attendance at the weekly training workshops and any information that may be outstanding for example a reference or a supervision meeting.

Karen Edwards, the Mentoring Project Manager at Bolton Lads and Girls Club, underlined the importance of the database to the operation of the mentoring project:

“It’s an Access database system that our project administrator has developed and created and it is the backbone to everything we do”

“When you think about the type of young people we are working with that have been referred maybe from a child protection committee or from the Youth offending team these are very vulnerable young people and we would expect nothing less than to be able to get hold of our mentors who are working one to one with them, touch base with them, find out how the meeting went, provide some support over the telephone and then be able to liaise back with the social worker or the teacher or whoever about how the relationship is going. All that information is input directly onto the database. Every contact we have we can view at the touch of a button to look at the whole relationship of how that young person and mentor have worked together”.

04 Manchester Event Volunteers (MEV): Volunteer database

MEV maintains a database of over 2,500 enthusiastic volunteers who continue to support a wide range of community, national and international cultural and sporting events.

On receipt of an application form, the individual is registered onto the MEV database after which they then have access to information on the MEV website. They also elect to receive a monthly newsletter by post or via e-mail, which highlights current volunteering activities and opportunities. All documentation is available in printed format as well as electronically to ensure that those without access to a computer are not disadvantaged.

Records of the volunteers and mentors are maintained through management of the database. Full details are recorded including all data from the application form, training records and records of each event volunteers have expressed an interest in and those they have subsequently attended. This ensures that accurate reports on all aspects of volunteer/mentor activity and feedback can be produced quickly. MEV maintains all records in line with the Data Protection Act.

Working with clients

01 Bolton Lads and Girls Club: Highly developed volunteer referral system

The project has established a highly developed referral system and no longer needs to promote the project to encourage referrals.

Bolton and Lads Girls Club now work closely with a variety of agencies and organisations that refer young people to the project who are experiencing difficulties of whatever nature. These agencies include social services, youth offending teams, schools, youth service, connexions, CAMHS and parents. A growing number of young people are even referring themselves. Karen Edwards, the Mentoring Project Manager at Bolton Lads and Girls Club, outlined their approach towards referrals:

“We don’t have a specific criteria anymore for referrals. Basically our referral criteria is around whether a young person would benefit from one to one support from a volunteer mentor for whatever reason and whatever the issue is, then we will do our utmost to find an appropriate mentor to work with that youngster. So that might be around issues around substance misuse, youth offending or it may be around bullying within school or family breakdown. We have a wide ranging group of young people and therefore we need a wide ranging group of volunteers to be able to have the best matching process in place.”

The Project is currently working with 140 young people aged between 8 and 21 supported by a team of 130 active community volunteer mentors, with a waiting list of over 155 youngsters.

This clearly demonstrates a need for this type of support service for vulnerable young people, and shows that this type of volunteering is appealing to a wide audience of potential volunteers.

 

02Insert 3: CAN Footsteps Social Skills Programme

CAN Footsteps have decided to completely modify and develop their Social Skills Programme and are now running a new pilot scheme that involves Footsteps presenting a set of six workshops specifically relating to people who have, or have had, drugs and/or alcohol issues, which in turn have impacted on their status.

The Workshops are more practical in nature and are using different types of media to highlight these issues and through which Footsteps hope to encourage participants to recognise and acknowledge their own personal issues, and by so doing, encourage them to begin to address such issues.

The presentations and discussions that take place during each workshop will encourage communication, and promote confidence and self-esteem, which will thus, encourage their desire and commitment to take those first steps towards moving away from their past and towards a future of hope and new horizons.

The workshops are being run over a six weeks period:

Week One Using “film” as a reality check on what is possible to achieve, and to initiate discussion.

Weeks 2 & 3 Recognising and identifying drug & alcohol issues cut across social, cultural and economic strata and what can be learned from this.

Week 4 Personal profiles that are unique but have sufficient common ground to encourage solutions and promote positive outcomes for the participants.

Week 5 Analysing, comparing, contrasting and applying identifiable methods and solutions to each individual’s specific situation and set of circumstances, in an endeavour to begin looking at opportunities for change.

Week 6 Regenerate past goals, identify new ones and encourage participants to take a positive step towards achieving them.

At the end of this six week period, Footsteps will assess and evaluate the processes and initial outcomes of these workshops, using both Participants’ and Presenters’ Evaluation Forms. Footsteps will then reassess and amend if/where necessary, before offering further sets of workshops to teams within CAN and to outside agencies.

Quality standards

Information Available Very Soon

Disseminating Good Practice to other organisations

01 The Volunteer Centre Carlisle: Disseminating good practice to other organisations

The Volunteer Centre Carlisle is a service provided by Carlisle Council for Voluntary Service, and is part of a national network of agencies concerned with volunteers and volunteering.

One of the activities that the Centre deals with is the development of good practice. The effective dissemination of good practice to other organisations has evolved into a good practice itself, the main features of which are as follows:

 

 

01 Poole Volunteer Centre: Promoting Best Practice around volunteering

The Poole Volunteer Centre is a project of Poole CVS and runs the Older People’s Volunteer Project. The aim of the project is to involve more older people in Poole in volunteering, especially those who may face barriers to volunteering.

The need to identify and share best practice in promoting volunteering to older people has resulted in a programme of events being devised to include:

 

 

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