Social Inclusion — Targeting Social Need
  What
I intend to do this morning is to give you a little of the political
background to the Social Inclusion agenda, talk about the challenges
for Children’s Library services and tell you a little about
the projects that appear in the new YLG publication All our Children.
Which, incidentally, is on sale at a discounted rate for delegates
this weekend.
Although this session is not a publicity stunt for the publication
I make no apologies for referring to it as it provides a very
useful overview.
Before I start there are just a few general points I would like
to make
All Our Children
Social exclusion or inclusion?
Firstly is it Social Exclusion or Inclusion? Both terms are used
often both by one department or organisation. Some people feel
very strongly about which should be used. Personally, l feel that
inclusion stresses the positive whilst exclusion emphasised the
negative but there are lots of people who would disagree. I've
decided not to lose sleep over it but just accept that both terms
are used.
Which definition?
There has also been concern and endless discussion over which
definition, and there are numerous, that we should use. I have
chosen to use the definition used by the governments Social Exclusion
unit. Again let's not waste time arguing over the semantics but
rather grasp the concept and get on and do it!
And just before I make a start can I just reaffirm that we all
believe in the words of Ted Hughes that
Even the most…
"Even the most misfitting child
Who’s chanced upon the library’s worth
Sits with the genius of the earth
And turns the key to the whole world".
You need to agree with those sentiments because if you don’t
really believe that library services and access to books has a
relevance to All our children and that libraries can change lives
then you will struggle to implement an inclusive library service.
I was sent this email earlier this year from an ASCEL colleague
and I'd like to share it with you this morning.
If we could shrink the entire earth's population to a village
of precisely 100 people, with all the existing human ratios remaining
the same, it would look something like this. There would be:
- 57 Asians
- 21 Europeans
- 14 from the Western hemisphere, both north and south
- 8 Africans
- 52 would be female
- 48 would be male
- 70 would be non-white
- 30 would be white
- 70 would be non-Christian
- 30 would be Christian
- 89 would be heterosexual
- 11 would be homosexual
- 6 people would possess 59% of the entire world's wealth
- and all six would come from the United States
- 80 would live in substandard housing
- 70 would be unable to read
- 50 would suffer from malnutrition
- 1 would be near death, 1 would be near birth
- 1 (yes, only 1) would have a college education
- 1 would own a computer
If you're sitting there desperately trying to make that add up
to 100, it won't. But it does help to illustrate the complex nature
of exclusion.
Inclusion?
When one considers our world from such a compressed perspective,
the need for inclusion, understanding and education becomes glaringly
apparent.
The Background
And now a little about the background of Social Inclusion
Social inclusion
The term "social inclusion" has its origins in European social
policy.
First reference 1992
According to the House of Commons Information Service the first
reference to it was in 1992 by 1994 it had started to be used
more frequently.
The first document they can trace using it was EU Social Policy:
Combating Social Exclusion and Promoting Social Inclusion.
Social Exclusion Unit 1997
In 1997 the Social Exclusion Unit was established which reports
directly to the Prime Minister.
The unit defines social exclusion as:
"A short-hand label for what
can happen when individuals or areas suffer from a combination
of linked problems such as unemployment, poor skills, low income,
poor housing, high crime environments, bad health and family breakdown."
Government Aims
The Government has specific aims in tackling social inclusion,
these are:
- "Better educational achievement"
- "Increased employment prospects"
- "Improved health"
- "Reduced crime."
Policy Action Team (PATS)
In order to develop policy the Government set up a number of
Policy Action Teams (PATs). In 1999 DCMS chaired PAT 10, which
covered Arts and Sports. DCMS produced overall aims for the implementation
of the recommendations of PAT.
- "To promote the involvement in culture and leisure activities
of those at risk of social disadvantage or marginalisation,
particularly by virtue of poverty, age, racial or ethnic origin.
To improve the quality of people's lives by these means"
Six Point Plan
In 1999, DCMS published draft social inclusion policy guidelines,
Libraries for All, for consultation. It encouraged library authorities
to adopt a strategy based on a six-point plan.
- "Identify the people who are socially excluded and their distribution.
Engage them and establish their needs."
- "Assess and review current practice - consider how far the
service already provided meets those needs, and what more should
be done."
- "Develop strategic objectives and prioritise resources - plan
the services and arrange the funding."
- "Develop the services and train the staff to provide them
- library staff need to be involved in the process and given
the training and skills they need to be effective."
- "Implement the services and publicise them - as well as making
new services available, it is important that they are properly
publicised among their target audience."
- "Evaluate success, review and improve - it is important that
the outcomes and successes of the service are regularly evaluated
to ensure that it is meeting its objectives."
Following the consultation period the guidelines were published
in their final form in 2001 as Libraries, Museums, Galleries and
Archives for all.
Open To All
In the meantime in 2000 Open to All: The Public Library and Social
Exclusion: LIC Research Report 84 was published. This report concluded
that:
"Public Libraries are, at present,
only superficially open to all. They provide mainly passive "access"
to materials and resources and have service priorities and resourcing
strategies which work in favour of existing library users rather
than excluded or disadvantaged groups"
As part of the research project that led to this report there
had been regular consultation with library service practitioners
and, as a result of discussions at a seminar in 1999, the Social
Exclusion Action Planning Network was created.
The Public Library Standards contain a number of specific references
to the promotion of social inclusion. Including the setting of
"local targets" for services to socially excluded people and children
and refers Authorities back to the six-point plan from Libraries
for All.
ASCEL
An ASCEL (Association of Senior Children's and Education Librarians)
"quick and dirty" survey late in 2000 revealed the following:
- "Only 10% of authorities had an agreed policy or strategy
for addressing the needs of socially excluded children and families?"
- "Only 55% of authorities had reviewed charging policy in the
light of the social inclusion agenda"
- "No authorities said they had fully adopted the six point
plan from the DCMS document "Libraries For All" Whilst 66% said
they had gone some way towards adopting them."
- "46% of authorities had developed pilot projects to address
social exclusion."
A recent survey carried out by LGA showed that 20% of authorities
have no social inclusion strategy and are not planning one.
All Our Children
There has been a wealth of publications by various bodies and
department and it is difficult to keep up with them all.
At the back of the new publication you will find lists of key
publications and organisations.
I have found that membership of the Public Libraries and Social
Exclusion Action Planning Network is an excellent way of keeping
yourself informed about current developments, funding opportunities
and publications. Contact details are also in the publication.
Community Services Group
It is also worth looking at the new web site launched on the
7th September by the community services group
The Challenge and opportunities for Services to Children and
Young People
There is no doubt that Libraries have the potential to play a
key role in tackling social exclusion but in order to make a real
difference "step-changes" will need to be made. Resources,
staffing, training and service priorities will all have to be
addressed.
Social Inclusion is not a fad; it is not going to go away. It
is high on the agenda of both Government and Re:source
and is something we need to take on board and deliver. The plethora
of reports need to be translated into action.
It is true that Libraries had their origins in Social Inclusion
and that Children’s Services have been very active in drawing
in non-library users. As a children’s librarian I cannot
remember a time when I was not concerned about the most disadvantaged
children in our communities.
However it is worrying, but not altogether surprising, to read
in the 1999 Usage of Public Libraries Insight research that that
two out of three library users are middle class.
- 2 out of 3 library users middle class
But too often outreach work has been seen as either time limited
project work or as additional services. What we need to
ensure are truly inclusive libraries where work
with excluded groups becomes part of our core service. We need
to move from the position of "our doors are open everyone
is welcome" to positive proactive action.
- Investing in Children 1995
As I said Inclusion is not an idea that is new to the profession,
in "Investing in Children" published by the Department
of National Heritage in 1995 (and which, incidentally, the
Library Association hopes to re-launch and celebrated later this
year)
Recommendation 13…
Recommendation 13 said
- "Every library authority should have a strategy to ensure
and promote access to it’s resources for children and young
people".
Children and Young People: Library Association Guidelines for
Public Library Service
And in the second edition of the LA Guidelines for Children and
Young People published in 1997 Catherine Blanchard noted
- "Children from all backgrounds and abilities have a right
of access to library services"
All Our Children
This is a real opportunity, with the support of both Government
and Re:source to
reassess our services in line with the six-point plan from Libraries
for All.
So returning to the six-point plan where do we fit in?
Identify the people
We need to know what the position is now within our authorities
to map what the needs are and what provision already exists.
The reasons for social exclusion are complex and difficult to
define in a neat paragraph.
Children can be or, feel to be, excluded for a wide range of
reasons, including low self-esteem and low confidence.
They may feel alienated due to sexuality, culture, religion,
class, and accent or because of lack of resources.
In identifying excluded groups much can be gained from cross-departmental
working and gathering data from across the authority.
Education, Social services and Health are obvious partners. As
are early Years Partnerships, Sure start, Education Action Zones
and Bookstart. Libraries also need to ensure that they have input
into Community Planning and Neighbourhood Renewal strategies.
At a recent cross-departmental working party on Social Inclusion
within my own authority the following list of target groups of
children and young people was drawn up. Since the meeting I have
already added children of service families to the list. These
are a group of children, who may move frequently and therefore
change schools, have problems making friends and accessing local
services like health services and Libraries.
I am under no illusion that this list is exhaustive but it is
a starting point to illustrate the range of situations and conditions
that contribute to exclusion.
The list is in no order other than the way they came up in the
session.
Children who
- "Have special educational needs"
- "Are in the care of the local authority"
- "Come from a minority ethnic group"
- "Are travellers"
- "Are young carers"
- "Are living in families under stress"
- "Are young or teenage parents"
- "Are poor school attenders"
- "Are being educated not in school"
- "Live in fragile accommodation"
- "Are young asylum seekers or refugees"
- "Have medical conditions"
- "Are children of prisoners"
- "Live in secure accommodation"
- "Live in poverty"
- "Are victims of neglect/abuse/bullying."
- "Are challenging their sexuality."
- "Live in rural isolation"
It is crucial that we get involved, if you don’t know who
is leading on Social Inclusion in your Library Service find out,
as children’s Librarians you have a great deal to offer.
Are there any crosscutting initiatives that the library service
could become involved with? What is you Early Years Partnership
doing about inclusion, in West Sussex I chair the Early Years
Inclusion sub group which ensures that libraries are not overlooked
or underestimated.
On Monday morning I am going to the second meeting of a group
looking at Inclusion in relation to all the services to children
across the authority.
Current Practices
We are all aware of exciting and effective projects reaching
some of these groups, and at the risk of repeating myself lots
of them are included in the YLG publication. The best of these
result in fundamental changes to or developments in provision
that enhance our service.
Mainstreaming Social Inclusion will mean that we have to look
long and hard at our current practices and re-evaluate their impact
on inclusion. Obvious areas for debate are:
- Joining procedures just how many forms of proof of
address do we really need! And when should a young person be
able to join without a guarantor?
- Fines we know what a disincentive fines can be, is
social inclusion an opportunity to challenge their necessity
for young children?
- Blacklisting, what is its impact on the children of
blacklisted parents?
- Allocation of funds, what percentage of staffing budgets
and bookfund go on work outside library buildings
- Promotions if all our library promotions take place
within libraries how are we going to reach the non-users?
- Marketing, we need to spend more money on promoting
our services in non-traditional places, on buses, in supermarkets
and DIY superstores and in pubs.
- Opening hours, just how family friendly are they
- The appearance of our buildings, what can we do to
make them more inviting, accessible and less threatening?
- The working practices of children’s librarians,
how much time do they spend out in the community making contact
with excluded groups? Should we, like Youth Services, have detached
Children's librarians working out in the community and not tied
to a building?
- How and where we place the stock? Would it be better
used in waiting rooms, youth clubs, children’s homes, traveller
sites, refugee centres, army camps…..
- ICT, where we place it, how we use it and most importantly
how we make it accessible to those who have no personal experience
or expectations of technology
- The stock we buy. Now I am going to take a liberty
and my apologies to Sarah. When I was first asked to speak at
this years conference it was at the Sunday morning slot where
some other lucky people now have the chance to look at books
that change lives. When Sarah asked me if I would swap and do
this slot instead I was happy to do it but sorry to lose the
opportunity to talk about books. So I’m going to do it
now with just a brief mention of one or two books that have
had an impact on some of the children we have worked with this
year.
Fair's Fair
You may remember the 1996 YLG publication Fair’s Fair. Bernard
Ashley did the introduction to the section on class and he said
"There are loads more children reading fiction then can
be squeezed into the country’s inglenooks or along its cushioned
window seats. Children in schools, in flats, lets, council homes
and libraries — on sites, in camps and centres, and, when
the urban sun shines, on the balconies — they all need a
rich diet of every sort of book imaginable. And they need to know
that they are represented with the rest, with stories to be told
and experiences to be shared, of no less value than anyone else’s.
That way we grow. Some children might have it hard — and
there is no class divide in that- but they can hold up their head
with the rest when they’re in a book, in print, part of the
heritage"
If you haven't already discovered them please try
Stargirl…
- Stargirl by Jerry Spinelli published by Orchard about
a child who is so unique that she just doesn’t fit in.
A magical book for all those who have ever felt "different"
and for those who have agonised over whether to make the first
move with the new kid at school.
- Malachy Doyle’s vivid Georgie published by Bloomsbury
a disturbing yet realistic account of a destructive child in
care trying to come to terms with his abusive past. (This book
had a profound effect on me and as part of our inclusion work
with Social services I now have social workers keen to review
books! They felt it rang true and would strike a chord with
many troubled children)
- And let’s not forget Carnegie winner Beverley Naidoo's
The Other Side of Truth published by Puffin a powerful story
about unaccompanied asylum seekers.
Of course it is not only about titles but about formats, ClearVision,
braille, spoken word, large print, dual language, electronic and
at levels to suit all abilities.
I could go on but I won’t I’ll try and stick to the
brief!
Strategic Objectives
On to Point 3 Strategic Objectives
We need to accept that social inclusion work is often difficult,
time, staff and resource intensive and will not produce
a quick fix. By the very nature of their exclusion these
children will take time and patience to win over, progress can
only be made in small but significant steps. Whilst the impact
on the individual may be huge the impact on issues may be negligible.
It is a well-known fact that if your only objective is raising
issues then your time would be much more effectively spent on
promoting the service to regular and casual users, rather than
to those who have not yet discovered us.
It is important that our objectives relate to Government objectives,
the Vision or Strategy of our Authority and the objectives of
other major documents such as the Education Development plan and
Community strategy. By doing this we will be working together
towards shared aims and be able to build upon each other’s
strengths
We need to move forward on the development of strategic objectives
and as I said before Children’s Services have lots of experience
to draw from and ideas to contribute to the development of clear
Social Inclusion Strategies. It may be that we do not actually
need a separate policy but more to ensure that the issues of inclusion
are implicit in all our policies including those relating to charges,
physical access, stock, Best Value and staffing. As John Vincent,
of the Social Exclusion Action Planning Network, said in a recent
article in Library Association Record August 2001
Strategic Objectives
- "Mainstreaming and sustainability are the main issues
facing Social Exclusion work in libraries"
Staff…
And point 4 Staff
The inclusion of staff at all levels is crucial. If managers
are having problems keeping up with the reports how are staff
on the ground being kept in touch with the issues? Do staff
know what Social Inclusion is? How does it affect libraries and
the work they do? How is knowledge and policy going to be cascaded?
How can they feed into the process?
Training is a key issue and for some staff adopting inclusive
practices may be difficult. Without training not all library staff
will have the skills needed to deal with excluded groups. We need
to accept that if we are going to be inclusive some of the children
we will be encouraging will be "challenging" and we
will need well-informed and adaptable staff and systems
if we want them to be included. Staff need to understand the principles
behind the policies we adopt and be empowered and encouraged to
make inclusive decisions.
Point 5 Implementation
Once policy has been decided and services have been implemented
then it is imperative that we promote the services within
the communities they hope to serve. This will mean being much
more focussed on marketing beyond the library and will involve
further consultation and community involvement.
Point 6 Evaluation
Finally we need to evaluate success, review and improve our services.
This could be a challenge because it is very difficult to set
performance indicators for inclusion work. As I said previously
working with excluded groups does not always produce the kind
of statistics we are used to using like issues and new members.
We must not depend solely upon the anecdotal but need to work
towards some acceptable and universal means of measuring success.
There is a meeting in October run by IPF (the Institute of Public
Finance) to discuss Benchmarking and best practice in Social Inclusion,
which may come up with some solutions.
All Our Children
And now a little about some projects:
I only have time to give you a taster of the range of projects
detailed in ALL our Children, a bit like the very best book talk
I hope to tempt you to buy a copy and find out more!
Projects…
Enfield library service has demonstrated its ability to
develop and deliver new services and to contribute to the achievement
of corporate goals and objectives.
Their Play Start project delivers bulk loans of books to under
fives. Funded by Sure Start it targets refugees and provides advice
and training for parents and carers.
Barriers that prevent some families from using the library have
been broken down by the project, which has less bureaucracy.
The sure start project has 25 partners and by working with these
the Library Service can be sure of targeting the most needy.
Enfield is also working with families in temporary accommodation
and the Somali community with RIF running family literacy groups
for Somali woman.
What is important is the aim that all these diverse projects
are managed as an integral part of Enfield’s Children’s
Library Service.
Kent Library service has had to adapt to very rapid change
in their response to the influx of young unaccompanied asylum
seekers. Their project emphasises the need to react quickly to
new situations and find a way for the service to respond quickly
to changing demand.
Birmingham sought to reach out to the traveller community
via Bookstart. One of the big problems was that there is only
one permanent site and most travellers get moved on from one patch
of private land to another within the seven days allowed by the
local authority. This made contact difficult and library services
had to move quickly! Having made contact with different departments
Education proved the most useful. Education staff have Bookstart
packs take them to travellers when they first arrive, and explain
about them.
Progress has been very slow and the nature of the project means
that evaluation is difficult.
London Borough of Sutton has been developing work with
Special needs children. After working with a group of children
from the local Mencap group at an integrated playscheme where
they were promoting the Reading Relay they built on the partnership.
With funding from DCMS Wolfson they planned outreach visits to
Mencap groups. The outcome has been a leaflet aimed at families
with Special needs children and vital staff training and support.
Westminster Libraries worked with a group of disafected
young people to re-vamp the teenage collection in Paddington.
They involved young people in consultation design and book selection
and hoped to enhance provision, increase use and change the target
groups perception of libraries. David Almond opened the new look
teenage area; he proved a big hit, as did the library where issues
are up by 91%!
Suffolk has been working with Looked after children. They
have developed a welcome pack, promoted the library service to
foster carers and started introductory visits to the library for
groups from residential homes. The welcome pack includes an invitation
to join the library which young people are asked to give to staff
when they visit, this alerts staff who can then wave any outstanding
fines if the child is already a member.
Of collections placed in five of the Children’s Resource
centres one member of staff said
" For children who have very little in the way of material
possessions these books become treasures"
A non-library contribution is from Storyteller Patrick Ryan called
Secure Storytelling about using stories with young offenders.
In Northampton laptops, which can be taken into the community
have been used in a joint project between Libraries and Education
with less able pupils to provide study support.
West Sussex
Within my own authority in West Sussex we built on the success
of our big Arts Council of England funded project Voyage into
Books, which worked with 25 different groups of excluded children
and young people by focussing on one of the groups. We like Suffolk
targeted Looked after Children.
We set up a training day in a library, which pulled together
all the different agencies involved with LAC. We had talks from
Social services, Education and two library projects, with time
for discussion we ended with a talk from Melvin Burgess, who as
you can imagine challenged many delegates’ idea of a children’s
author (which was exactly why we chose him).
A working party was set up with myself, the Literature development
worker, Quality Protects Manager from social services, someone
from the Looked after Children Education team and a foster care
co-ordinator.
The first thing we did was to submit a bid to LaunchPad's Reading
Challenge Plus. This was successful and gave us the kick-start
we needed. We worked with three children’s homes and a group
of foster carers. We visited the homes regularly, taking in books,
sometimes from the library, sometimes for the children to keep,
sometimes even signed copies and we included magazines.
We spent time talking to the young people and gaining their trust.
We held an open evening for foster carers in one of our community
libraries.
The highspot of the project was a book BBQ! We had 25 children
and 25 carers so yes me and the Quality Protects Manager cooked
for 50 when the two blokes from education let us down at the last
minute. The young people were very apprehensive. We had a brilliant
African drummer, who is a qualified music therapist to break the
ice and he managed to win over even the toughest of teenagers.
He had social workers, librarians and education staff doing tribal
dances as the children played the drums (unfortunately, or fortunately,
we were all dancing so there is no photographic evidence) .
When we told them the next entertainment was a poet our most
challenging young man replied " well I’m not staying
for fucking poetry!"
This is him, the boy on the right, the boy that was not
going to drum and didn't want to stay for poetry!
Poet Nick Toczek (who we had seen at last year’s mega YLG
conference and had earmarked as being just right for the audience)
was a big hit, his ability to do street magic helped. We gave
each child a collection of Nick’s poetry, which he and Risenga
the drummer signed at the children’s request.
I know that the same boy that was not going to stay for poetry
has his copy by the bed and on the nights after the BBQ the young
people read poems out loud to each other, something that had never
happened before.
Our challenge is now to ensure that we maintain the service and
integrate it into core services.
Funding Streams
It is interesting to note the range of funding streams that have
been drawn on to support the projects I have mentioned which include:
- "Sure Start"
- "Reading is Fundamental"
- "DCMS Wolfson"
- "Prince's Trust"
- "Education Business Partnership"
- "New opportunities Fund"
- "Quality Protects"
- "National Literacy Association"
- "SRB"
All Our Children
At the back of the publication you will also find details of
these and many more.
In conclusion, it is crucial that Children’s Librarians
- build upon the experience of others working in the field
- keep up to date with the literature and
- work in partnership with other areas of the library service
and other departments within the authority to ensure that we
create a truly inclusive library service for all our children.
I would like to finish in true Children’s Librarian style
with a poem that, for me, epitomises the child we are trying so
hard to reach, no it’s not Timothy Winters, wonderful as
that poem is, it is a poem by Tony Bradman called The boy which
you can find in John Fosters collection Excuses, Excuses.
Excuses, Excuses
The Boy
I am the boy in the playground,
The boy who stands by the wall,
The boy that nobody likes much,
And some don’t like at all.
I am the boy with a problem,
The boy at the back of the class,
The boy who finds it hard to read,
And tests too hard to pass.
I am the boy no one plays with,
The boy that walks home alone,
The boy that some wish didn’t exist,
And who wishes his heart was stone.
I am the boy with no future,
The boy with a difficult past,
The boy who ought to be first in the queue,
And somehow is always…. The last.
Thank you.
Lesley Sim
Head of Services to Children & Young People, West Sussex
Other Conference items
One Fragile World Beverley
Naidoo
More Or Less? Delivering
A Best Value Library Service For Children — John Dunne
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