BME Mapping Exercises
COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT PROJECT FOR THE MAPPING OF SERVICES AVAILABLE IN THE VOLUNTARY SECTOR FOR BLACK AND MINORITY ETHNIC CHILDREN AND YOUNG PEOPLE (AGED 0 -18)
As students of Plymouth University we have recently completed a Community Development project, to research services in the voluntary sector of Plymouth that run projects for Black Minority and Ethnic (BME) and Asylum Seeker and Refugee (ASR) children.
This piece of work was commissioned by Jeremiahs Journey, in partnership with PDREC, to develop an understanding of what services the voluntary sector currently offer BME and ASR families.
Our purpose has been to produce a resource pack containing relevant information, for example agency contact details and their purpose, what projects they run and the support provided to enable users to access their service, and any criteria thereof.
We thought that the following information and graphs would be of interest:
Response and Information Collated
Our process for collating this information was through a questionnaire, the response rate to which was 54%. We contacted agencies on several occasion via telephone, email and in person to endeavour to increase the opportunity for capturing as much information as possible. However, it has to be appreciated that the resource pack is purely based on the information received from the agencies who did respond, and that some of the questionnaires were only partially completed – therefore although the final report shows some interesting statistics and findings, it is not a full or true representation.
Monitoring & Statistics
Due to the nature of the voluntary organisations and the range of users, some systems of monitoring were more informal and we found that some of the statistics were close approximations.
Advertising and Publicity
We felt that this was of note, as the main form of advertising was word-of-mouth, which could be of disadvantage to new families to the area, who may not have the links to find out about and access such services in this way.
Accessing Services
During our research, from the questionnaires and statistical information from EMAS regarding number of BME children in Plymouth Schools, we found that many of the children (and families) may not be accessing appropriate services outside school. Please note that our research was based on children aged 0-18, however accurate statistical information for ages 0-5 were not readily available.
Findings
The general findings from our research were that we felt there are identified gaps in services available specifically targeting BME and ASR children, particularly for childcare for toddlers aged 0-5, which offer the opportunity for activities and social networking for marginalised children and families from different nationalities. We feel that this is very important in order to meet the specialised needs of BME and ASR children (and families) around for example, identity, trauma, confidence building, language as a barrier etc. There also seemed to be some restrictions on services in terms of availability and very specific age groups targeted, which could mean that some children/families maybe disadvantaged from not being able to access particular services and activities.
Please click here to access the resource pack.