This report contains the details of the investigations from the LSCB Young Advisors who were commissioned to explore issues surrounding young people and their opinions and involvement with Art and Culture activities.

Contents:

-Introducing the LSCB Young Advisors and the Commission

-The Who: LSCB Young Advisors

-The Why, What, When: The Commission and Report

-The How: Plan and Collection of Data

-Summary of Findings

-Data collection

-Focus Groups

-Questionnaire

-Graffiti Wall

-Demographics

-The Findingsand Recommendations

-What young people consider art and cultural activities and what are art and culture activities they are interested

-What barriers young people face when they are trying to engage with art and cultural activities and what support is needed

- LSCB Young Advisors recommendations

-How young people find out about art and cultural activities

-LSCB Young Advisors recommendations

-How young people feel about art and cultural

-Closing thoughts

-Appendix

  1. Questionnaire
  2. Graffiti Wall
  3. Demographics table and charts

-Notes

-Acknowledgements

Can change the font of the report to make it an easy-read copy if you would like to change the font please contact Jacqui Taylor at

Introducing the LSCB Young Advisors and this Commission

The Who: LSCB Young Advisors (LYA)

The Liverpool Safeguarding Children Board (LSCB) Young Advisors team are working to improve our communities and attempting to find ways to solve issues for young people, working alongside community leaders and through social action. All LSCB YA’s are aged between 15 and 24 and are AQA qualified, enabling us to carry out our role as Young Advisors efficiently and effectively.

The LSCB YA’s are part of a national organisation, consisting of 40 Young Advisors teams and as a result, can engage with a wider network for support and experience. Other YA teams have worked together on Regional, National and International projects. We were brought together by the LSCB to capture the voice of children and young people in Liverpool in a unique way. The LSCB have oversight of the LSCB YA’s. Targeted Services for Young People work in partnership with LSCBand both organisations provide the LSCB YA’swith constant supervision. Management, help and guidance to aid each commission.

The LSCB Young Advisors group recognise children and young people, bring unique expertise and knowledge about being young to influence an organisation's strategic planning, decision making and marketing. They insightfully map provision, gaps and problems and the LSCB YA’s work directly with other young people encouraging them to become involved. The Young Advisors network is managed by a central charity, which brings the network of social franchises across the UK cohesion and support.

The Why, What and When: The Commission and Report

The aim of this commission is to find out what young people think about Art and Cultural Activities and how and why they engage with it. The agreed cohort was children and young people between 10 and 24. When the Liverpool Cultural Education Partnershipcommissionedthe LSCB YA’squestions were provided to aid the commission.While we understand the practicality around helping young people financially or in ways that money is needed to support young people, the LSCB YA’s wish to see positive action and hope to try and alleviate the issuesand gaps in support which areoutlined in this report.

The Liverpool Cultural Education Partnership would like to;

  • Develop a ‘kite-mark’ and resource for good practice to help arts organisations focus on the inclusion of vulnerable children and build their capacity and skills to support diverse and challenging needs;
  • Co-design with young people and children’s agencies, a process for sharing and reflecting on good practice and challenges, so that art organisations can effectively remove barriers to access.

The aim of this report is to be able to assistin these goals.

The timingsgiven to us for this commissionwere January 2017 and to completeitby April 2017, howeveran extension was granted and the completion date amended toJune 2016.

The How: Plan and Collection of Data

This commission is the third commission by the LSCB YA’s and we have learnt from the previous commissions but theseprocesses are still relatively new to us. During this commission,we were guided and received support fromour supervisorsJacqui Taylor (LSCB) and Julie Murphy (Targeted Services).

At the initial planning meeting relating to this commission, Jacqui and Julie supported us in deciding how we would approach the commission, how we would collect and collate information, signposting groups to engage with and attending focus groups and aiding in the completion of this report.We followed the suggestions that were given to us fromLiverpool Cultural Education Partnership by using focus groups, questionnaires and using graffiti walls. We felt that this enabled the LSCB YA’s to engage with the young people through different mediums and enabled children and young people who may have difficulty reading or writing to also engage in this process and provide their voice or if they preferred to draw, this was also available, rather than speak up.At the end of the meeting roles were delegated to LSCB YA’s and we were remindedtophone or email our supervisors for any help if needed. the YA’s arranged to go to focus groups, with the designed questionnaire and arrange for completion of these and arranged for some responses to be captured via graffiti walls where time was available.Not all young people were able to attend focus groups and therefore some questionnaires were emailed to the young people. i.e. young people who work with the Protect Team, or young people we didn’t have the capacity or time to meet. Also, if two YA’s were not able to attend focus groups, a supervisor would assist with facilitating the group.Team meetings and supervision regularly took place duringthis commission and updates were provided, whether that be for support or for new ideas to emerge.We were also supported with the drafting of the questionnaireand the report.

For thecollectiondata,wedesigneda questionnaire askingchildren and young people aged 10– 24for their thoughts and opinions relating to theArts and Culture.We have had engagement with 95children and young people during this commission.The questionnaireconsisted of questions to getboth quantitative and qualitative data. The graffiti wall gave us more visual data. To ensure itwas accessible to everyonecompleting it,we made sure not to use any complex languageor jargon.We also included a paragraph at the beginning explainingthe aim of the commission and why wewere asking for the questionnaire to be completed.Bygetting data from young people who identify themselves in numerous ways, we could see if any patternsemergedincertain groups to make it easier for Liverpool Cultural Education Partnershipto address.

Summary of Findings

The top three answers relate to what children and young people consider to beart and cultural activities and what children and young people are interested in are the same. Children and young people consider art and cultural activities to be;

  • Art and Craft
  • Drama
  • Music

activities they are most interest in are;

  • Art and Craft
  • Music
  • Drama

When asked what areas they are interested in, the children and young people provided a more extensive list.

Young people came up with many reasons as to why they don’t engage or stopped engaging with art and cultural activities. The most common themes identified were;

  • travel and transport
  • cost

Other popular answers included growing out of the age range of the activity, not having the confidence to go and a loss of interest. On the other hand, many young people feel that they do not have any barriers or problems when trying to engage with art and cultural activities.

The best way to support children and young people is to;

  • encourage young people to engage events with friends
  • having a location that has accessible bus and train routes
  • cost of attending is affordable (cheaper prices)

The best way to advertise art and cultural activities ensuring that children and young people are aware of them is through;

  • social media
  • friends

Other ways are through school announcements and having other youth groups give shout out.

It was apparent throughout this commission that children and young people really appreciate art and culture. Young people gave a range of answers showing how individualistic they and their reasons are for wanting to part take in art and cultural activities. The most common answer given by young people regarding the question about whyengaging in art and cultural activities is positive was around socialising.If all the categories relating to helping children and young people’s resilience were combined, this would be the largest group.

Data Collection

The Focus Groups:

As part of our investigation we were given specific cohorts of CYP thatLiverpool Cultural Education Partnership wanted to get opinions and suggestions from and even if we were not provided with the list of cohorts, the LSCB YA’s would aim to engage with a range of groups that aren’t often listened to. The following groups were attended:

  • NSPCC
  • Barnardo’s Young Carers
  • Child in Care Council
  • SPLICE (Wavertree, Clubmoor, and Childwall)
  • YOT
  • Protect
  • Neuro Champs

We had a few problems trying to engage with groups like AEPs, LGBT+ and BAME groups, but think this was mainly due to clashes in ours and their availability.

The Questionnaire:

As it is unlikely that we would have a focus group with everyone who engages with this commission, YA’s designed a questionnaire which helped us to capture the voice of young people who were happy to engage with LSCB Young Advisors, but did not want to engage face to face. Liverpool Cultural Education Partnership also provided alist of questions that were to be asked/answered.LSCB YAs held a discussion group to review the questions provided and after consideration we agreed that the questions were sufficient and no further questions were required. The agreed questions were;

  • What art and cultural activity are you interested in?
  • How do you find out about art and cultural opportunities (word-of-mouth, referred?)
  • What would stop you getting involved?
  • What support do you need to get involved?
  • What have you got involved in?
  • What stops you coming back?
  • What practical barriers are there?
  • How do you think engagement and interaction in art and culture could be important for you?

A common issue that occurred was that some young people felt the questions were too open and thus found it difficult to answer the “right” way. Another issue was that they found it difficult to differentiate between the questions regarding young people not getting involved and the practical barriers, often listing practical barriers as a response toboth questions. See appendix II. The questionnaire. From this questionnaire, we could capture both qualitative and quantitative data which resulted in better analysis.

Graffiti Wall:

It was suggested to us byLiverpool Cultural Education Partnership to use graffiti walls as well as questionnaires. This was a new idea to collect data and a very creative and enjoyable. Some of the focus groups found it relaxing doing the graffiti wall. All the information that young people drew on the graffiti wall was also written within the questionnaire.

The LSCB YA’s received positive feedback to using the graffiti wall and that young people found it enjoyable and could stay focused and we will use this process in future commissions See appendix III. for pictures of the graffiti walls from focus groups.

Questions 1 to 7 covered CYP demographics:

Age:The majority if participantswere aged 16 or 17although many responses came from young people outside of this age bracket.

Gender:60% of young people identified as female and 40% male.

Post Code: We also took the post code of all young people who engaged with us. See appendix IV. for the post code table and charts for the demographics.

Ethnicity:74% ofthose asked identified themselves as White British.

Sexuality:71% identified themselves as straight; refusing to answer this question was the second highest response.Girls who are attracted to girls can use “gay” rather than “lesbian” to ID themselves.

Religion:45%said they had no religionor simply “No” as many put, the second largest religious group captured was Catholic with 21%

Disability: Most respondents 68%said they were not disabled and 32% saidthey did have a disability.

Children Looked After (CLA):Children and Young People we engaged with were also asked if they were part of the care system and 25% stated that they were. 75% either answered no or refused to answer.

The Findings and Recommendations

What young people consider to be art and cultural activities and what are art and cultural activities are they interested in

A&C stands for art and culture.

We asked young people what do they consider to be an arts and culture activity and themes such as art, music and drama were mentioned a lot. The most popular answers given were art and crafts, drama and music with 41%, 36%, and 32% percent of young people giving that answer respectively. Other activities such as beat boxing, poetry, visiting museums and art exhibitions were also mentioned. Many had also mentioned food being part of the activity or as a treat or incentive to go.

There are many categories that are broad like arts and craft, music or festivals. They did sometimes specify what was meant which included drawing, painting or glitter and glue for

arts and crafts, or listening to music rather than playing, or going to specific festivals like LIMF, V or African Oyé but most of the time they did just say the generic category.

Many of the young people who engaged with the commission listed various activities, however some had a more emotional response such as; “having fun” and “engaging people in a creative way” rather than specific activities. One young person has answered the question, “In your opinion what would an art and culture activity involve?” with “talent”.

A&C stands for art and culture.

This list is longer compared to the previous graph and relates to about what young people regard as an art and culture activity. Different activities were identified within these responses like food, comic strips, or role play. In response to what young people consider art and cultural activities, arts and crafts, music, and drama topped the list for this question. Many had said for arts and crafts that they enjoyed drawing, painting, and colouring in. This again is like the previous question. Music was usually just mentioned as music but

sometimes it was specified as listening to or making music. Drama was another common answer, many suggested they really enjoyed it and liked acting.When asked “What young people consider to be art and cultural activities”, (Rather than listing activities) one young person answered: “Engaging, hands on community based projects,”this shows that some young people would rather work in groups and work towards more extrinsic goals that could interest others and help them getinto art and cultural activities.

Some young people have said they only engage in art and culture in school, doing either art or instrumental lessons. The former stated that they were only interested in doing it in school and the latter stopped it as it became too impracticaland there was no indication of them not enjoying it anymore. Several young people mentioned wanting to learn or being interested in art and culture from other countries or culturesor wanting to learn something that they had not tried before like dance. Some of the less mentioned answers are graffiti, comic strips, media, food, and architecture which were mentioned by boys. The most popular answers given by boys was music (23%) followed by festivals (16%), such as V, African Oyé, Pride and LIMF, and then theatre, drama and drawing with all 13%.

What barriers young people face when they are trying to engage with art and cultural activities and what support is needed

LSCB YAs asked three questions regarding what stops young people getting involved in art and cultural activities.

The questions were:

Question 11. What would stop you getting involved in these activities?

Question 13. Have you ever been involved in any art and cultural activities, and stopped? If so, why?

Question 15. What practical barriers are there?

We also asked what support young people need to tackle these issues.

The biggest issues that appear to prevent Children and Young people from engaging in art and culture is thecost, includingtransport, the cost of the activity, timings of the activities/other commitments, clashes with other activities or that the time of the events were during school time, travel and transport, inaccessible transport routes or no transport links to some venues after a certain time. Some problems mentioned are more internal such as being too anxious to go or being uncomfortable. Young People also said that they would not want to go by themselves or would feel more comfortable going with friends.