Mared Williams explains why personality is essential for community health projects and their success.
The success of a community health project is down to more than careful planning and funding. Personality is key.
In 2015 the hapi (healthy, aspiring, prosperous and inclusive) project was established by Newydd Housing Association following a successful two-year funding bid to the Big Lottery People and Places Fund. Through targeted health-based interventions, the over-arching focus was to bring the health and housing relationship closer together for the benefit of residents in the Rhydyfelin, Hawthorn and Glyntaff areas of Rhondda Cynon Taff.
Aiming to support over 800 people over the length of the project, Lisa and Hannah, the hapi project staff, have already engaged with 525 people in their first year (June – June 2016), delivering varied activities such as Get Cooking classes, Only Dads Allowed, Beach Olympics, Family Soap Box, walking football and mindfulness sessions using a flexible delivery approach. Some 84 per cent of young people said they were more confident in accessing support on issues such as smoking, alcohol and sexual health after engaging with the hapi project. Around 70 per cent of participants reported an improvement in their knowledge and understanding of food and nutrition following initiatives and 89 per cent of those who engaged in physical activities improved their level of physical activity.
Lisa and Hannah used their expertise to maximise every ‘teachable moment’ in an effortless way:
- When participants of Only Dads Allowed came into the hall on a lovely sunny day the team sold the session as an ‘indoor barbeque’
- At a coffee morning staff quietly reached for a special chair for a participant who later commented: ‘I don’t know if you noticed, but I have my own chair here in the corner, because the kind ladies appreciate that I need a special chair to sit in, and so it’s always here for me.’
- As Hannah fully participates in the Kangoo Jumps class, she is able to read the room and update and motivate them on the number of steps they had already completed and how many were left until they reached their goal of 10,000.
The team’s accessible approach and personal enthusiasm has led to high levels of engagement with residents. An evaluation of the project identified key attributes that contributed to the project’s success including the flexibility of the funding conditions, proactive commitment to working with key partners, free activities to all participants but most importantly the skills and attitudes of the staff team. Partners also praise the expertise, enthusiasm and professionalism of the team too:
‘Some of our parents, when they see different people, feel a little bit judged and shy, but Hannah and Lisa didn’t come across like that at all. After meeting them they instantly felt at ease, it was lovely.’ Hawthorn Primary
‘What I particularly like is that it’s a very hands-on session. Hannah was on the floor with the young parents demonstrating and talking about healthy meals.’ Young Parents Group
Undoubtedly the hapi project has seen success in its communities due to Lisa and Hannah’s employment. With backgrounds in Communities First, including youth work, health and wellbeing activities and physical activity delivery, including a degree in sports science, both have the knowledge to back up their practical and sociable skills to make hapi a creative, helpful and supportive project that has made a real difference to people’s lives.
There are, however, some issues that the project team still need to consider and resolve. On reflection, partnerships with health bodies continuously evolve and, despite the project being co-designed by health partners from its onset, referrals to the hapi project have not been guaranteed. These relationships need to be worked upon on a continual basis to ensure that social prescriptions have equal priority to medical prescriptions.
Accurately monitoring and evaluating outcomes is difficult to achieve too. First, the paperwork put off participants and second it is difficult to measure the success of long-term targets such as the reduction of risky behaviour, for example smoking.
Big Lottery Funding comes to an end next year but Newydd aims to expand the project to new areas. The following quotes from participants prove that the hapi project formula works, and will hopefully continue to work beyond 2017.
Mared Williams is marketing and communications manager at Newydd Housing Association