1. Brief Description of Project The aim of the project was to pilot and build on the Resilience Forum, incubating it in Hastings through the combined efforts of collaborators included on the bid, such as Xtrax Young People’s Centre and Finding Futures. The forum is currently being delivered as collaboration between the Centre for Health Research, School of Health Sciences, University of Brighton and boingboing social enterprise, at Falmer and in Brighton. The resilience forum is a networking space for ‘anyone with a pulse’ to learn, discuss and debate ideas and developments around resilience. It brings together a range of partners, including parents, young people, professionals and academics. A further aim of the project was to build the capacity of vulnerable young people and adults from Xtrax and Finding Futures with the confidence and esteem to access the forum and ultimately to co-present a session.

2. Project progress

Through this application the intention was for the forum to be developed through a partnership between Dr Claire Stubbs, in her dual role with BoingBoing and the University, other academics in the School of Health Sciences including Professor Angie Hart and Dr Josh Cameron, Xtrax Young People’s Centre and Finding Futures. Through her previous work in Hastings as Youth Development Manager, Claire has strong links with the community and various organisations and now in her role within the University she attempted to create a strong bridge between the two. Professor Angie Hart is Claire’s supervisor and managed the collaboration, bringing international connections and long term involvement in resilience research and practice to the partnership. This time from Angie Hart and other UoB collaborators was provided as an in kind contribution.

Dr Stubbs and Professor Hart, coordinated tasks such as the forum calendar hosting academics and practitioners in the field of resilience locally, nationally and internationally. Dr Stubbs coordinated room bookings and speaker requirements. In addition she spent time liaising with other community partners, understanding the issues locally and integrating their needs into forum topics. Dr Stubbs established herself in one of the shared offices at the university in Hastings. Dr Stubbs also attempted to maintain regular contact with Xtrax and Finding futures to support the capacity building of the young people and adults in accessing the forum. The Finding Futures consultation took place, and results from the consultation are described below. . At the start of the project Xtrax Young People’s Centre lost their funding completely and there was a dissolving of the service and they were unable to engage in the project.

Prior to the forum starting Dr Stubbs met with the service users of Finding Futures. The aim of this meeting was to understand the needs of the service users in supporting them to come along to the forum. The meeting also gave them an introduction to the topic of resilience.

Six service users attended and it was a productive session. The group felt that they were interested in the idea of a forum and initially would need support from Finding Futures to come along. It was felt that this could be provided and transports costs would be supported too. The following themes emerged from the consultation:

1. What do you need from the forum? • Practical skills around things like problem solving skills • How to be safe emotionally and physically • Where to get information on money matters, benefits, housing etc. • Assertiveness skills • Handouts that are written in a way that is easy to understand and inviting • Content that is simple and not overwhelming so I don’t feel bombarded • Confidence building • A mixture of information and practical, interactive activities • Skills that I can apply in my everyday life • Local services and what they offer and where I can find out stuff
2. What would you like to go away with? • I want to feel confident…. • Fresh • That is has been useful • Accomplished
3. What would support you to come along? • Seeing the building first before we come to a forum • Having support from a worker to come with us • Going along as a group together • Having an informal meet and greet session where nothing is expected of us initially and we can get to know others • Trust • Safety in the group • No more than 10 people in the room • Not talking about sensitive issues • Time from my job to come along • Short bursts of time so we can take in the information, 20 minutes etc. • Decent coffee and biscuits • Having a virtual forum session here first • Having you come in and do some confidence building work with us beforehand • The room being set up as a comfortable circle group like here today • Flexible times so that it is not at the same time all the time Unfortunately following this session there was no further contact from Finding Futures and therefore no further work able to proceed. The individual who was managing Finding Futures at the time was very much behind this piece of work and yet sadly she retired as the work was starting. Therefore, the new lead didn’t have ownership over the project and this could explain their disconnection. It may have been beneficial to persist and go to the service directly in support of their re-engagement. The first forum took place in September 2014, hosted by Dr Claire Stubbs and partners from a range of agencies attended. There were over twenty people in attendance at the first forum from voluntary and statutory sector agencies within Hastings and surrounding areas. One staff member from an agency bought a young person along to the forum too.

The first forum focused on what agencies and individual’s needs were within the space and the consensus was to understand more about resilience and acquire skills that people could use within their practice. It was also agreed that the space needed to support the inclusion of “everybody and anybody who was interested in resilience and therefore needed to be a space that was informal and people could learn by experience.

The forum has been delivered on a monthly basis and there have been over thirty people in attendance each time. The most popular forum to date was the forum on Mindfulness where over forty people were in attendance and three young people attended this forum. Forum topics have included Introduction to resilience, Practitioner Resilience, Methodological Empathy, Resilience to Re-offending and Mindfulness. Professor Michael Ungar was invited as a special guest to present at a forum focusing on “Working with Troubled Families: Nine Steps to Promoting Resilience.” This session was a huge success and approximately 100 people were in attendance. This session also raised the profile of the forum and people came to future forums as a result.

The Youth Offending Team brought a young man along to the first session and he expressed an interest in attending other forums. He also demonstrated potential through his sharing of aspects of his journey within the forum and it was apparent that the audience’s attention was engaged. To support his development further, Claire Stubbs offered him the opportunity to volunteer and support the delivery of the forums. He co-hosted the forums with Claire and skills work, such as presenting to an audience, answering and responding to questions, sharing his personal story in a way that others can elicit the resilient moves, and his own learning about resilience. A decision was made by Angie Hart to further include him in wider BoingBoing and University of Brighton research and practice development. This was in order to ‘define in the doing’ some of the community of practice’s aspirations regarding the inclusion of young people as co-researchers,, co-trainers etc. The group have been on that journey for some time, but the practice needs consolidating. Parents have already been successfully included in this way and another young person who was volunteering at the University of Brighton and BoingBoing has now been taken on as a paid Artist in Residence and project development worker. The young man who originally came to the Hastings forum is now presenting regularly at national and local training days and takes pride in sharing with his friends that he is “a co-facilitator within a university.” As a result of seeing the university and Boing Boing working in collaboration with the young man, the Youth Offending Team wanted to implement a peer mentoring scheme to further support his development and other young people. Sadly, appropriate system structures were not supportive of this development, however staff within the service are still pursuing the cause and this may be a positive conduit of the way in which the forum was working and encouraging others to adopt this practice method. The young man has just been interviewed for a paid position as a trainer and project development worker at Boingboing supported by the collaboration with the University of Brighton. The seed funding has supported the development of the forum within Hastings on a regular basis and brought people into the University who perhaps have not accessed the university previously, including the young man in question. In addition it has provided him with a platform to support his continuing professional development increased his social capital and his skills and knowledge acquisition.
3. Partnership Working A range of agencies including Boing Boing, Children’s Services, Youth Offending Team, Sussex Partnership Trust, Carer for the Careers, Crime Reduction Initiatives, Sussex Downs College, Education Futures Trust, probation and academics from within the University of Brighton ( Hastings) attended the forum. The forum enabled the sharing of knowledge and expertise in the area of resilience and thus enhancing the connectivity between these different partners. The questionnaires and case studies offered by practitioners who accessed the forums demonstrated that the dissemination of research and practice tools enhanced knowledge and skills that was disseminated to the wider community of vulnerable adults and young people. The challenge with partnership working was to support other agencies within the community to take ownership of the forum and feed in their own topics and co-host. It may be a symptom of the culture that currently exists whereby services are overstretched and have little resources, as the forum appeared to offer a space where people could network, attend and receive the information was that being exchanged, rather than take ownership of or co-producing within the space. This may also be due to the time limited nature of the project and further time could support this development.
However, a strong partnership did develop between the Youth Offending Team, Boingboing and the University of Brighton in support of the young man’s involvement in the forum and his own personal and professional development. The YOT supported him to access the forums, ensuring he was able to attend by overcoming any travel barriers and supported his attendance at other training opportunities that fed into his overall learning and skills development. On Our Doorsteps were supportive in providing contacts and links within the community. More support in encouraging academics and students within the university to attend and raising the overall profile of the forum within the university may have been helpful. There is a genuine issue about getting academics and students from other parts of the university to attend events at Hastings and to develop their practice there.Three words that would describe the experience of this seed funded project are, Exciting, Unexpected and Hopeful. What has been achieved so far is Exciting and although this might seem like a small outcome, the young man’s involvement was both exciting and an Unexpected outcome of the project. We have been able to build on other connections within the BoingBoing group and are exploring the option of connecting up another young man with learning difficulties (who is a co-researcher on a PhD study that Angie Hart is supervising) with Claire Stubbs and the young man who got involved via the Youth Offending Team. The funding has provided profile for our resilience and it has potentially kick started some significant capacity building in disadvantaged young people. The feedback from practitioners and individuals who have accessed the forum offers hope for its development in the future. 4. Outputs The forum provided a training output for professionals and individuals working and living within Hastings and surrounding areas. The project aimed to establish and develop a forum in Hastings which functioned as an egalitarian learning space for local community members, academics, parents, and young people and this was achieved. Feedback from professionals and other individuals attending demonstrates that the forum was based on local issues and need. The forum calendar was interesting and based on local community members’ needs ( highlighted in the first session) and included up to date issues and research debates within the resilience research field. Dunno what this means,, this para. Questionnaires that have measured the impact of individuals attending the forum have found that: to include. Collaborators involved in the forum have also co-produced an article which has been accepted as a Chapter in a Springer Book on Communities of Practice. The Hastings forum and examples of practice were used to illustrate the challenges and benefits involved in developing communities of practice in action. The findings have also been presented at conferences, including internationally.

Dr Claire Stubbs delivered a keynote on resilience at an event for practitioners supporting looked after children local to Hastings.
5. Outcomes Total number of people accessing the forum: Two hundred and thirty eight people have accessed the forums over the last year. Number of partners accessing the forum: Fifty different partners have accessed and been involved in the forum. Questionnaire feedback summary: Three case studies below illustrate the experience of professionals’ experience of the Hastings forum. I came to the Hastings Forum principally to support a young man. I hadn’t known him previously and I was VERY impressed by what an extraordinary opportunity it was for him and how well he did in the role. During the course for practitioners which followed, I also attended with the young man and it occurred to me that we should ask him to support another young person working with the YOT (as a peer mentor). I would advocate more of this kind of involvement when young people seem suited to the peer mentor role and have sufficient experience in common with the person they are mentoring, however on this occasion the arrangement was not permitted.

The concept of Resilience has certainly played a part in my practice and I have the Forum to thank for this. I am critical about just one element: discussion about ‘academic resilience’ appears to support navigation skills by young people who need the help of e.g. counsellors or therapists. It doesn’t appear to address the opportunities for altering the structure or the curriculum of e.g. secondary schools.

The influences on me have not affected my practice (though I do think the concept is a useful one, requiring more work within the YOT) so much as my thoughts about future research. I have revised my decision to study within the Resilience umbrella and I now wish to thoroughly examine the concepts underpinning the education system, probably in a philosophy department.

I think that the Resilience Forum in Hastings should continue. Hastings is a place where there is much activity that can benefit from Resilience approaches. I would like to see more young people involved in the way that the young man I supported has been.

Case Study two. The Hastings Resilience Forum has turned out to be different from what I was expecting. Prior to attending I assumed it would be a mixture of people from different professions and backgrounds who met together to look at what could be done to improve the resilience of local people. I have always been interested in resilience and how you build that in adults and children and thought I might learn something from those who attended. The forum has in fact been far more useful with a range of really knowledgeable and interesting speakers who have given me a much better understanding of resilience both from a theoretical and a practical perspective. I have been thoroughly impressed by the quality of the speakers each and every time and come away after each session feeling inspired and more driven. Since having a clearer understanding of what resilience may look like for both adults and children I have found myself looking for those strengths in the families that I work with and try to build on those. I also introduce the concept to parents when talking about their child’s development. My favourite session was the resilience for professionals. It really emphasised how important it is for everyone to take responsibility for the welfare and morale of the team; to make sure we celebrate and praise each other when things go well but also ensure we all feel safe and supported when things don’t go well. We have made a conscious effort to nurture and support each other and this has had very positive affect on us as a team. Although our roles continue to be demanding and stressful the morale in our office is very positive and we are collectively closer. I really hope the forum will continue and provide the quality of speakers Claire has found for us. I recommend it all the time to colleagues and other professionals. Case Study Three I found the Hastings forum very useful. It has an informal supportive atmosphere and it has been great to network and share experience with other professionals and to gain a further insight into the concept of resilience and how we can apply it to both our professional practice and our personal lives. I unfortunately couldn’t attend one of the forums and I felt I had missed out I had some prior knowledge of resilience theory but this forum has helped consolidate this and bring it more to life The facilitators have been very open and approachable and created a creative and friendly atmosphere. I found it particularly poignant and interesting hearing a young man who has been supported by services during his life speak of his experience of resilience I have found it useful both in applying resilience theory and mindfulness professionally and personally. It has helped me think about my own resilience, what protective factors I’ve had in my life growing up which have helped me cope and how I can work with young people, looking at protective factors around them and things which can support them. I have practised mindfulness with parents and young people. Mindfulness is a new concept to me which I have taken from the forum and applied the theory to my practice, trying to help bring some peace and space into high stress situations I definitely feel the forum needs to continue. I really want to bring a parent I am working with to the forum as I think she would really benefit but she doesn’t usually have the access to this kind of experience. I see part of my role a facilitating my clients to experience anything which will help broaden their skills and knowledge. I see this forum as particularly accessible and supportive and it is unique as it advertises itself to everyone and not just professionals working in the field

1. Longer term knowledge exchange work We have already covered some of this in the earlier sections. We have the potential to include Hastings young people and others as co-trainers, and to build on the work of one of our Phd students Anne Rathbone some of whose co-researchers are based in Hastings. Learning from the forum in Hastings is also going to be included in subsequent publications we are writing as part of our ESRC-funded Imagine project outputs. We have a small co-design product development grant from the AHRC (£8000) and have included Hastinga-based people in the project groups for that. The reputation of the UoB and Boingboing resilience work led us to be asked by East Sussex commissioners to help shape the tender requirements for a programme of resilience training in East Sussex schools.
   Angie Hart has responded to colleagues external to the university who are applying for professorial fellowship appointments. She has raised the profile of Hastings in these discussions and we would hope to undertake further resilience work with people in Hastings. Angie Hart has been contacted by the headteacher of an Academy in Hastings who is keen to explore co-working. The application of Hart and Williams’ Academic Resilience Approach (which has been adopted by YoungMinds, a national charity supporting young people’ mental health outcomes) will be the likely focus of this work (http://www.youngminds.org.uk/training_services/academic_resilience). Being based in the university and taking learning from the young man involved in the forum has inspired Claire Stubbs’ work with disadvantaged women in the community of Hastings. This work is planning to take on a greater “beating the odds and changing the odds” approach through supporting the women to train as facilitators of a resilience based therapeutic programme delivered to other disadvantaged women. Through delivering the forum in Hastings, women who have accessed Claire’s group came along to the forum and it dispelled myths about accessing a university building. To build on this opportunity, links with academics such as Marylyn Fyvie Gauld have been forged through Claire’s presence in the university and through working together there is an opportunity to link students on the public health courses into the therapeutic programme as there is a gap in terms of their own psychological health needs and resilience based interventions.
2. Statement of Income and Expenditure
3. Quantitative Evaluation The number of people involved : 238 people attended across the forums The number of people attending events: There have been on average fourty people at each forum, with a total of 238 attendees. The numbers of people who have benefitted from the activities: This is difficult to determine as the case studies highlight individuals are using what they have taken from the forum into their practice. In addition the young man who is now delivering training is reaching a wide number of individuals, therefore it is estimated up to approximately 500 people are benefitting. Number of hours worked on the project; Me: 7 hours week ( additional work at the beginning so I have averaged it out) for 7 months = 196 hours.