Compass BUZZ – North Yorkshire

Compass BUZZ is an innovative project which works with the whole school workforce and other key partners in education settings across North Yorkshire to: • Implement whole school approaches to raise awareness, reduce stigma and promote positive mental health in children and young people (CYP.) • Increase professionals' knowledge, values and skills to proactively support CYP around their emotional and mental health. • Provide low level support to CYP at the earliest stage possible thus preventing problems escalating through to specialist services. • Build resilience by increasing the number of CYP able to cope with emotional difficulties

Co-Production

  • From start: No
  • During process: Yes
  • In evaluation: Yes

Evaluation

  • Peer: Yes
  • Academic: No
  • PP Collaborative: Yes

Find out more

 

 

 

What We Did

Compass BUZZ is an innovative project which works with the whole school workforce and other key partners in education settings across North Yorkshire to: • Implement whole school approaches to raise awareness, reduce stigma and promote positive mental health in children and young people (CYP.) • Increase professionals’ knowledge, values and skills to proactively support CYP around their emotional and mental health. • Provide low level support to CYP at the earliest stage possible thus preventing problems escalating through to specialist services. • Build resilience by increasing the number of CYP able to cope with emotional difficulties. Compass BUZZ supports schools to embed the whole school approach by providing tools to help strengthen the mental health and wellbeing of CYP aged 5-18 (25 with SEND) through: • Tiered training and action learning – delivering a rolling programme to school staff and the wider CYP workforce to increase knowledge and application of practical everyday tools.

• Levels 1-4 training, promoting early help and awareness / protection strategies: 1 – Prevention and promotion (whole school training delivered to all staff in contact with CYP in schools (including senior leaders, teaching staff, lunchtime supervisors, etc) as well as other professionals working within an education setting such as police, school nurses, local authority colleagues, youth workers, etc.) 2 – Early identification of need (on completion of level 1, for those in school with a more direct role in supporting CYP, such as pastoral staff, school counsellors, year heads, SENCOs, youth workers, school nurses and teaching support staff.) 3 – Early help and intervention (for those who have completed level 2 – this training is followed up by specific coaching from a BUZZ wellbeing worker to enable staff to deliver one to one or group sessions directly to CYP.) 4 – School senior leader workshop (for all those in a senior leadership role, such as head teachers, deputy and assistant heads, governors as well as public and mental health commissioners, etc. to embed a sustainable whole school approach. Follow on support with BUZZ wellbeing workers, combined with the development of peer support networks, helps to embed the learning.) • Professional consultation – facilitation and coaching schools to achieve academic resilience and make positive changes to their culture, policies and practice and develop peer support networks. • Early identification of issues – followed by appropriate intervention, to help prevent mental health problems from escalating. • Co-delivery of structured one-to-one/group CYP interventions – supporting school staff to deliver low level interventions via consultation, advice and guidance. • Confidential text messaging service – open to CYP aged 11-18 with queries or concerns around mental health and wellbeing. School level impact Compass BUZZ launched in September 2017 and consists of a team of 8 front line wellbeing workers (together with a team leader, specialist administrator and support from a service manager) working with all 393 schools and colleges across 3,324 square miles to transform the culture of North Yorkshire schools and address mental health stigma. The project is designed to positively impact all school aged children (5-18/25 with SEND) across the county, totalling more than 70,000.

Through a combination of approaches we are now reaching approximately 95% of the school and college CYP population. The team’s tenacity to get schools on board and a commitment from the wider workforce is already driving cultural change and has had a high impact across the county in a very short period of time. “The training helped us to identify what we already do very well and some next steps….We are just starting to draw together ideas for further developing the work we began this year by incorporating actions into our School Development Plan again next year. The action planning which we did following the training will be very useful to help us identify key priorities and actions to feed into our whole school development plan for the forthcoming academic year.” (Head teacher) The project is phased; initially using promotion and engagement to get schools and professionals on board, and then delivering training by level, and most critically using a variety of innovative follow up delivery methods to ensure that learning outcomes are embedded. Key to this has been for each school to identify a mental health lead, who has then been instrumental in developing a bespoke mental health and wellbeing action plan for their school, supported by their local BUZZ wellbeing worker. Another example is follow up coaching, with a BUZZ wellbeing worker, for those staff who have undergone level 2 and 3 training, in order to build their confidence and skills and enable them to provide direct support to CYP facing emotional and mental health issues. The same wellbeing worker has then been on hand to co-facilitate at least the first direct one-to-one or group session with CYP, delivered by that member of staff. We have adapted a nationally recognised programme, based on the Young Minds Academic Resilience Approach and embedded it using a whole school approach. This has helped to create a fun and interactive resource for schools to support CYP. “The really useful Resilience Framework, complete with a toolkit of ideas to use, is a fantastic resource to support and extend our work in school.” (School inclusion manager, level 1 training) How the service makes a direct impact for CYP As already introduced above, Compass BUZZ has enabled school staff, through training, coaching and co-facilitation, to deliver sessions directly with CYP, which did not happen previously. These sessions equip CYP with strategies and techniques to manage their own mental health and wellbeing.

What has made the project successful, with a high level of impact over a relatively short period of time and across a vast geographical area are the attitude, qualities, values and approach of the BUZZ team members, who have been persistent in sharing the importance and positive benefits for schools to fully engage in the BUZZ programme. “I feel far more confident to deliver interventions to young people.” (Teacher, Cawood Primary) 75% of CYP who completed their sessions reported that they had achieved their goals. “Working with Compass BUZZ started really quickly but didn’t make me feel intimidated. They were reassuring and listened to my problems and then gave me useful things to help.” (Year 5 pupil) “At the start of the sessions I was really nervous and didn’t think anyone could really help me. But talking about my feelings and finding solutions helped me, whether it was a stress toy or some paper to scribble on. I feel like my anger has started to happen less and less, even after three sessions.” (Year 9 student) Examples Following the training, schools across North Yorkshire have developed their own bespoke mental health and wellbeing action plans and have begun to implement their own changes to raise awareness, reduce stigma and build resilience of their CYP, examples include:

The creation of mindfulness corners with a selection of linked reading books at a primary school. • The use of mental health & wellbeing promotion stands by a college during fresher’s week. • A primary school has used fundraising to buy an online bereavement training package for staff in order to support affected pupils. • The introduction of weekly health and wellbeing drop in sessions at one school. • The re-design of a primary school playground to incorporate dedicated areas linked to each of the ‘Five Ways to Wellbeing.’ • Mindfulness clubs created within a secondary school, where CYP make mindfulness jars and practice breathing exercises to settle thoughts. • A primary school hosted dedicated world mental health day activities, such as yoga, spread the happiness, mindfulness and a walk in the fresh air. • A secondary school held an assembly on culture and the use of language around mental health. • A primary school have introduced a dedicated space for pupils for support around wellbeing and mental health. • 29 schools took part in a non-uniform day on World Mental Health Day to raise awareness within schools, which also used lesson plans and a PowerPoint presentation provided by Compass BUZZ. As a result of these approaches, the majority of CYP in North Yorkshire are reached and benefit from healthier schools, more confident & knowledgeable professionals as well as strengthened integrated care pathways with support from specialist partners.

 

Wider Active Support

Our partners are wide and varied and include: Key partners – healthy child practitioners, (school nursing) youth service, substance misuse and sexual health services, CAMHS, Youth Justice Service, Commissioners, Health Education England, Inclusive Education Service, North Yorkshire Police, professionals in GP practices, children and families services, educational psychologists. The whole school / college community – head teachers, governors, midday supervisors, cleaners, administrators, teaching assistances, SENCOs, counsellors, teachers, pastoral staff, etc. Compass BUZZ wellbeing workers also work jointly with key partners to drive more effective outcomes, for example: • Working alongside school staff to co-deliver one-to-one and group work interventions to children and young people using a mix of evidenced based interventions. • Building links with a broad workforce including professionals from GP practices and local authority colleagues, such as the Children and Families service workforce. • Producing videos with partners from across North Yorkshire, including the Local Authority Commissioner, Specialist CAMHS, etc. to outline the services available and the referrals processes, to support the training packages. The Compass BUZZ team are co-located with another North Yorkshire service ‘Compass REACH’ (who work with CYP aged 9-19 (25 with SEND) requiring early intervention in relation to mild to moderate mental health difficulties) and share a Service Manager. This brings positive integration and communication between these two CYP mental health services.

The Service Manager also contributes to each of the North Yorkshire CCGs Future In Mind Local Transformation Plans and is a member of the Social Emotional and Mental Health Steering Group and sub-groups (Interventions, Delivery, Workforce Development) working closely with local partners. Feedback from key partners who have attended training includes: “The Resilience Framework and 5 Ways to Wellbeing appear really useful ways to support children to find ways to improve emotional wellbeing and mental health.” Anonymous, North Yorkshire County Council (NYCC) Prevention Service, Hambleton & Richmondshire (level 1 training) “Brilliant training, easy to understand and interactive. Very interesting and relevant to my practice.” Tracy Shewan, NYCC Prevention Service, Harrogate (level 1 training) “Excellent trainer, very interesting, really learnt a lot. Looking forward to the next session.” Joanne Weaver, NYCC Healthy Choices (level 2 training) “Really useful assessment for schools. MI, SFT and CBT refreshers. All 3 sessions were excellent. Thank you.” Sion Osman, NYCC Prevention Service, Ryedale (level 3 training) “Interesting subject which was put together well. Interactive exercises covering different learning styles. Enjoyable and engaging.” Julie Kessell, North Yorkshire Police (bespoke training for North Yorkshire Police) “Informative – good range of topics. Made me think about how to react to certain situations and how to respond.” Laura Harper, North Yorkshire Police (bespoke training for North Yorkshire Police)

 

Co-Production

Service user and family involvement is paramount to ensuring we continue to develop and improve our services for their benefit. Championing CYP’s voice, rights and actively involving them in the co-production of services is embedded in all areas of Compass’ integrated governance framework. Our service user and family involvement policy outlines our ethos and approach. Compass BUZZ acts on what CYP say. We work closely with CYP in North Yorkshire; listening to their ideas, understanding what matters to them and improving BUZZ as a result, to make it more accessible. Their input and fresh ideas have helped us to create an eye-catching website, a series of short training videos and our service user charter. CYP have helped us in many ways and we couldn’t achieve these project successes without them! The Compass BUZZ project team includes a Youth Participation Lead who meets regularly with CYP to discuss ways of improving Compass BUZZ and consults with various youth groups and youth councils across the county, for example we attended and presented a workshop at the Youth Voice Conference in March 2018. Some specific examples of the result of these consultations with CYP include: • The project’s name ‘BUZZ.’ • The ‘bee’ branding for the project https://twitter.com/compass_buzz?lang=en • The name of the confidential text messaging service ‘BUZZ US’ (ChatHealth.) • The content and design of the bespoke website: https://compassbuzz.org/ followed various consultations with CYP, for example with Harrogate Youth Council. • A series of short videos co-produced with CYP to highlight the issues from their perspective, that have been used as part of the workforce training, for example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_AAR0dMHw-Y We also seek feedback from individual schools about discussions with their school councils about mental health and wellbeing.

 

Looking Back/Challenges Faced

We have overcome a number of challenges, for example: • Gaining school engagement – Effective promotion and communication has been key to the project’s success. Newsletters were sent to all schools/colleges to promote the training offer. Persevering BUZZ staff followed-up with individual schools. • Dealing with delivery across the largest county in England, which includes issues such as distance, rural geography, isolation and diverse communities – Focusing on existing hubs, such as schools and colleges but also GPs, etc. means we have been able to reach across this vast county. Staff worked flexibly from co-located teams, covering large distances to provide access for all schools and colleges. The use of BUZZ US text messaging means older CYP can access support and advice remotely. • Managing delivery to meet the needs of schools – Compass BUZZ staff have adapted training courses where needed, for example splitting longer sessions into two and then visiting some schools on several occasions to deliver these to ensure the whole school workforce have been able to receive the training at a time that suits them. Consultation with and feedback from members of the school workforce, who have participated in the training, enabled us to reflect on the importance of full engagement and endorsement from their senior leadership teams (head teachers, governors, etc.). Whilst this group have already been engaged as part of the whole school training, we identified that a workshop specifically targeting school and college leaders would increase their understanding of the new roles their staff are being asked to undertake in supporting CYP mental health and wellbeing. We see that this will be critical to the long term success of the project. As a result, when we had an opportunity to apply for funding from Health Education England, this became the focus of our successful application and we commenced the senior leader workshops in January 2019.

 

Sustainability

The project is built on a sustainable model of championing mental health awareness by adopting a ‘whole school / system approach’. With support from BUZZ, schools are being transformed by means of a bespoke mental health and wellbeing action plan, addressing improvement areas related to the mental health of pupils. Through the implementation of these action plans stigma around mental health is being permanently reduced across schools in North Yorkshire. The project builds and enhances existing resource, by up-skilling school staff, rather than creating a new standalone team, which means that all the learning is embedded and will remain should the project come to an end. Additionally, the training packages, supporting materials and lessons learned through this project could be easily rolled out in other geographical areas and the Level 4 training specifically, developed with innovation funding from Health Education England, on completion in spring 2019, will be packaged to enable this. Compass BUZZ is part of the Future in Mind plan for North Yorkshire and we are working with the commissioning group now to develop the next phase of the plan and seek longer term funding, which could be used to replicate some of the learning from the school-focused BUZZ programme to provide support for parents, carers and families.

 

Evaluation (Peer or Academic)

We are using a number of evaluation methods, including basic recording, such as the number of: • Schools engaging with the project. • Individual school action plans that evidence transformation. • Professionals who have attended the different levels of training. • CYP who have engaged with the BUZZ team directly via ‘BUZZ US’ confidential text messaging. • CYP who have engaged with trained staff from their school through one to one or group work. We are also then keen to receive and learn from feedback from all those who are engaging with the project in order to make continuous improvements. This includes observations from the Compass BUZZ team when training, coaching or co-facilitating with school staff members. Compass BUZZ wellbeing workers also work within schools, to review and evaluate progress made against the action plans drawn up by each school, to embed and implement learning. The wellbeing workers are looking at the techniques adopted in schools, the impact on policy, practice and environment and critically on how this is impacting on the lives of CYP within the school community setting.

Monitoring progress against the action plans help to measure distance travelled and scale of transformation over the lifetime of the project. This enables individual schools to self assess their own progress as part of their annual school planning cycle. Over the longer term, York University are undertaking a four year evaluation of the project using SDQs (strengths and difficulties questionnaires) to track outcomes for CYP from year 8 to year 11. Some examples of the evaluation that has already taken place. A relatively small, but critical part of the project is the engagement of CYP who identify a need for a one to one session with a trained member of school staff. Every CYP who participates in a one-to-one session is asked to complete a form to give feedback. The member of staff delivering the intervention helps the CYP to understand the questions, such as: • Now you are starting to work on your problem do you feel better? • If you needed similar help in the future do you know where you could go? • From the help you are getting in school, would you feel more able to manage the same problem in the future if you had it? • Are you happy that you can receive help at school with your problem?

Where these sessions are co-facilitated with a Compass BUZZ wellbeing worker, they will ensure that this evaluation takes place. CYP one to one feedback from the academic year to date 2018/19: • 96% of young people reported increased wellbeing (119 CYP) • 97% reported increased knowledge of how to access support (121 CYP) • 81% reported increased resilience – 8% were unsure about this (100 CYP) • 98% reported satisfaction with the service (123 CYP) • In addition, for both co-facilitated and non co-facilitated one-to-one combined 85% of young people achieved 100% of their goals. These results are particularly interesting as this is the first year that these sessions are really being delivered, following receipt of Level 3 training by 430 school staff across the county. In addition, all professionals and school staff who undertake training are asked to complete a questionnaire before the training and again, following completion to get an understanding of the change in their knowledge, competence and confidence in respect of CYP emotional and mental health and wellbeing. They are also asked for their feedback on their perception of the effectiveness of the training process, format, content and delivery. Feedback from 5551 professionals from the academic year to date 2018/19: Staff reporting increased knowledge following training: • Level 1 77% • Level 2 93% • Level 3 90% Staff reporting increased confidence following training: • Level 1 76% • Level 2 92% • Level 3 90%

 

Outcomes

Compass BUZZ has already worked with 352 schools, transforming the culture of these schools and addressing stigma through a whole school approach. As previously referenced the starting point is the delivery of 4 levels of training, targeting different stakeholder groups within schools and the wider CYP workforce across the county. To date: • We have trained 9624 professionals in mental health and wellbeing ‘Level 1 – Prevention and promotion’. After participating in the training, 91% of professionals who responded to our survey stated their confidence had increased in working with mental health in their professional role. • 195 schools (675 staff) have been trained in ‘Level 2 – Early identification of need’ and a further 38 schools have booked Level 2 (59% of schools received / booked level 2). • 154 schools (430 staff) have received ‘Level 3 – Early help and intervention’ training, with a further 60 booked (55% of all schools received / booked level 3) to enable them to deliver one-to-one and group sessions with CYP. • To date, 260 schools have booked on Level 4 – School Senior Leader Workshop, which commenced at the end of January 2019 (66% of schools). This training and coaching package means staff are better equipped to: • Prevent mental ill-health from arising. • Spot the early signs of mental ill-health. • Understand how to support affected young people.

These schools are now using action plans that are tailored to their school. The use of the Young Minds Academic Resilience programme has helped schools to understand approaches and practical tools to adopt a whole school approach including their pupil profiling and ensure they are taking into account school demographics, etc. to make their action plan relevant to their pupil’s specific needs. Following completion of Year 1 of the project, wellbeing workers have summarised the key actions specific to the action plans that include support with policy, identified mental health champions within schools and practical examples of how mental health has been incorporated within the school setting (as outlined in our ‘what we did’ response.) Since contract start: • 225 bespoke school action plans have been developed • 323 CYP benefited from BUZZ US confidential text messaging service with a total of 5523 messages received. • 129 CYP have received co-facilitated 272 one-to-one sessions. • 93% of CYP reported increased wellbeing following co-facilitated one-to-one sessions. • 81% of CYP who have completed one-to-one sessions, reported that they had achieved their 100% of their goals.

 

Sharing

We understand this project is a unique opportunity to develop a best practice approaches and improve the emotional health and wellbeing of CYP. We also collaborate with other organisations to share ideas and lessons learned through a range of channels which include: • The Yorkshire & Humber Local Transformation Plan celebration and learning event. • The Children and Young People’s Mental Health Digital Innovations shared learning event. • Evaluation of the impact of the half day ‘level 4’ training and planning workshops for school senior leaders, using Health Education England (HEE) funding – we are due to report our findings to HEE in March, alongside a toolkit being prepared to enable HEE to engage providers to roll out this workshop in other areas of the country. • An HEE annual celebration event. • Consulting with Area Senior Educational Psychologist; North/SEMH and the Lead Advisor for Social Emotional and Mental Health Inclusive Education Service on the content of the School Senior Leaders Training and Workshop in North Yorkshire. The service also produces a monitoring report for commissioners each quarter, including performance, statistical data, feedback, etc.

 

Is there any other information you would like to add?

The Compass BUZZ team have done a fantastic job at getting schools to engage in the project, through a whole raft of techniques and imaginative approaches to highlight the benefits of engagement. These methods include promotion via local media, social media, email, phone calls, drop-ins and meetings at schools, producing a newsletter to schools / colleges on project progress, and ultimately sheer determination. This promotion of first the training packages and then the broader project, has ensured there is greater awareness and positive engagement across the North Yorkshire population. Some specific examples (with hyperlinks) include: • For CYP, families and professionals – the creation and use of bespoke videos to impart key messages and examples of lived experiences of North Yorkshire CYP, available via YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCSQpojZkWC5_nXQ8QwW5UVA. • For CYP, families and professionals – the launch of a bespoke website, containing useful guidance and resources:

https://compassbuzz.org/. • For CYP – press releases picked up by a number of publications, including announcing the launch of the BUZZ US text messaging service, for example: https://www.digitalhealth.net/2018/02/mental-health-and-wellbeing-text-service-for-young-people-launched/. • For professionals – use of Twitter to promote training and share news, tips and advice relating to young people’s emotional and mental health: https://twitter.com/compass_buzz?lang=en. • For professionals – attendance at key events, such as head teacher conferences, Governance School Improvement Network Meetings, NYCC Safeguarding Conference, county-wide Youth Council Conference, etc. • Building community capacity – a report televised on BBC Look North in January 2018 showcasing the benefits of the BUZZ level 1 training at St Marys Roman Catholic Primary School in Richmond: https://www.dropbox.com/s/z7d38zmmyjd422x/MENTAL.mp4?dl=0. • General awareness – a recent interview with BBC Radio York https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p06vh6f3 in January 2019 (starts at around 2 hours 12 minutes) and various other interviews and appearances on radio including on Stray FM, Yorkshire Coast and BSBS Forces radio.

 

Can you please tell us who your service is commissioned by and provided by?

Compass BUZZ – the North Yorkshire School Mental Health and Wellbeing Project is commissioned by the North Yorkshire Partnership Commissioning Unit on behalf of the five Clinical Commissioning Groups which cover North Yorkshire via Future in Mind funding. Additional funding has been secured from Health Education England’s Innovation Fund (for Education and Training) to extend the project. The service is provided by Compass, a non-profit organisation delivering health and wellbeing services across England to create healthier lives and safer communities.

Share this page: