Evaluating the Schools Outreach Service and pupil outcomes

We use the following measures to get a baseline measure of emotional wellbeing within the first few sessions of working with a new child and family: - Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) completed with the parent/carer and with the class teacher. - The child/young person is asked to complete the Child Outcome Rating Scale (CORS) which rates their feelings across 4 domains: me, school, family and everything. - A goal based outcome tool is used with the child or young person in order to identify and measure progress of goals over time. These measures can be used to track progress throughout therapy, for example re-administering them at certain intervals or at review points across the intervention. In certain cases, we will use additional measures that are problem specific. For example, a common measure we might use is the Revised Children’s Anxiety and Depression Scale (RCADS). This would also be administered at the start of and at the end of our intervention to look at change. These measures are then also completed following the intervention at the point of closing the case, in order to assess change over time. In addition to these measures, the clinician will also ask parents and carers to complete the Experience of Service Questionnaire (ESQ) in order to get some quantitative and qualitative feedback on the service that they have received. At the end of each academic year the data for all cases that the Schools Outreach Team have worked with are collated to look at the impact of our service and to show change over time. This information is then presented in an end of year report which is fed back to schools and ensures that we continually strive to reflect on and improve our service.