MD2990 Young Ambassadors and HeadStart Action 2022/23 to 2023/24

1.1.    Young Ambassadors (formerly Team London Young Ambassadors) is the Mayor’s school volunteering programme which connects young Londoners with their communities through social action – when people come together to help solve the problems that are important in their communities. Since 2013, over 460,000 young people have improved their schools and communities by setting up projects on issues they really care about, such as the environment, gender equality, serious youth violence, mental health, and homelessness. The programme has developed over the years, with the most recent iteration delivering provision to support young people and also provision for teachers supporting young people from low-income backgrounds to overcome these barriers and increase the level of high-quality, inclusive social action opportunities.
1.2.    HeadStart Action is a personal and social development programme for young people who are at risk of becoming NEET (not in education, employment, or training) in boroughs with the highest levels of youth unemployment. The programme supports young people through mentoring to create their own community projects and social action in order to engage and inspire young people, develop life skills and provide the employer experience and connections they need to get ahead in the world of work. Since 2018, grassroots organisation have been awarded grant funding to deliver the programme locally. They have supported 845 young people to feel more prepared for further education and employment and enabled 366 young people to secure a paid job or work experience opportunity or equivalent.
1.3.    Since 2018 the #iwill Fund have funded Young Ambassadors (as well as, most recently, the My London programme). This year the #iwill Fund, administered by The National Lottery Community Fund, which supports young people to engage with social action, have awarded funding totalling £652,000 to Civil Society and Sport for their Young Ambassador and HeadStart Action programmes.
1.4.    Both programmes contribute towards the New Deal for Young People (NDYP) mission aims of ensuring all young Londoners have access to quality local youth activities in order to support their mental health, aspirations and employment opportunities, and empowering them to shape and lead with stronger relationships with parents, teachers, youth practitioners and peers.  

Young Ambassadors
1.5.    Young Ambassadors is the Mayor’s programme for engaging young people in social action through their schools. The programme encourages and supports young people (aged 8-18 years) to tackle local issues that they care about and aims to promote community engagement, active citizenship and social integration, while also having a direct impact on local communities. This total budget of £329,000, comprises £182,000 GLA budget (£121,000 in 2022-23, and £61,000 in 2023-24) and £147,000 National Lottery funding (£100,000 in 2022-23, and £47,000 in 2023-24).
1.6.    Young Ambassadors will run an enhanced programme of support targeting Alternative Provision (AP), Pupil Referral Units (PRU) and Special Educational Need and Disability (SEND) Schools. This will include workshops, micro-grants, and resources for young people to run community projects on issues they care about. Through a competitive exercise, £218,000 will be granted to an organisation specialising in alternative settings, who will support young people in those settings to run their own social action projects.

1.7.    Young Ambassador Grants will be a micro-grants programme to support school-based social action particularly targeting primary schools serving  areas of higher deprivation. This will enable schools to improve their community impact and embed youth social action into their practice. A budget of £88,000 will be granted to an organisation specialising in providing grants to primary and secondary schools, who will support the schools to plan and enact high-quality youth social action projects.

1.8.    A budget of £23,000 will allow the GLA to host an extended programme of youth engagement events at City Hall to engage young people from across London in community action projects addressing issues they care about and the Recovery Missions.

HeadStart Action
1.9.    The Mayor, under cover of MD2885, approved expenditure of £900,000 for HeadStart Action. Grant funding of up to £550,000 will be provided to around ten organisations to provide local social action opportunities and increased mentoring support. Grant funding of up to £300,000 will be provided to no more than two network delivery leads. These leads will support the 10 grantees by providing employability training and work experience opportunities for all young people taking part in HeadStart Action, as well as capacity building support and embedding the Mentoring Confidence Framework. 
1.10.    The #iwill Fund have awarded funding of £505,000 to HeadStart Action and cross programme monitoring and evaluation, giving a new total budget of £1,405,000, comprising of £900,000 GLA budget (£100,000 in year 2021-22, £450,000 in 2022-23 and £350,000 in year 2023-24) and £505,000 National Lottery funding (£300,000 in 2022-23, and £205,000 in 2023-24).
1.11.    The additional funding will allow a further seven grassroot organisations to provide meaningful social action and mentoring opportunities to a further 360 young people, and for those 360 young people to also receive employability training and work opportunities, allowing them to connect their social action habits with their futures. Grassroot organisations will also be supported by more extensive capacity building support. 
1.12.    Also funded from the National Lottery contribution of £505,000 is £35,000 towards monitoring and evaluation (M&E). This, alongside £50,000 of GLA M&E expenditure (approved under MD2885) will create a total budget of £85,000 to carry out evaluation measuring impacts across HeadStart Action and Young Ambassadors. This will be used to test delivery models, measure impacts and embed learning into future delivery. This evaluation will also be used to consider the contributions of youth social action to the NDYP, Building Stronger Communities (BSC), and Mental Health and Wellbeing missions, and how this can be developed. This evaluation contract will be procured in accordance with the GLA Contracts and Funding Code.
 

Young Ambassadors
2.1.    The outcomes of the programme are as follows:
•    more young people from marginalised backgrounds get involved in and lead social action activity to address issues they care about
•    more young people contribute to their communities and develop a habit of volunteering
•    improvements in community resilience, engagement and outcomes as a result of increased volunteering and social action focussed on Mayoral priorities
•    greater social mobility of participants as a result of their experiences of social action and related skill development
•    improved access for young people to social action and community projects by building schools and alternative settings’ capacity to create appropriate and appealing opportunities
•    greater teacher engagement and capability to successfully embed youth social action in their schools
•    the creation of a cross-sector network of collaborators from community, public, charity, cultural, academic organisations to share best practice and embed new youth focused approaches.

Programme KPIs

HeadStart Action

2.2.    The updated programme KPIs are:
•    720 young people are provided with at least 6 hours of mentoring support and take part in at least 16 hours of social action projects
•    720 young people are provided with at least 10 hours or employability training and access to employer and work opportunities
•    17 grassroot organisations will be supported with capacity building support to improve their mentoring and youth provision.

3.1.    Under section 149 of the Equality Act 2010 (the Equality Act), as a public authority the Mayor must have due regard to the need to eliminate discrimination, harassment and victimisation, and any conduct that is prohibited by or under the Equality Act; and to advance equality of opportunity and foster good relations between people who share a protected characteristic and those who do not. 
3.2.    Activity and programmes under the Mayor’s NDYP will provide support to children and young people most in need. This includes young people with protected characteristics, young people who are more vulnerable and young people most affected by the impact of COVID-19. Young Ambassadors will be particularly targeting young people who attend PRU, AP, SEND schools, and targeted primary and secondary schools. HeadStart Action will be particularly targeting young people at risk of becoming Not in Education, Employment, or Training. The NDYP delivery organisations will be asked to evidence in their applications, specific groups of young people they are targeting based on the need in their local area together with information on geographic areas of need.
3.3.    These programmes particularly promote equal life chances; reducing barriers to social mobility, demonstrating improvements in social integration and effective community engagement. This programme will involve working with young people, under-represented and disconnected Londoners to connect them through volunteering with education, training, and other opportunities to enhance their life chances and improve social mobility and social integration.
3.4.    Our work also embraces London’s diversity by connecting Londoners from a variety of demographical and geographical backgrounds together in support of commons causes. In addition, the GLA recognises young people’s contributions to their communities through regional Youth Summits.
3.5.    This project aims to work with disadvantaged young people and within that category the GLA will be ensuring that access is provided to all young people regardless of age, gender, sex, race, disability, sexual orientation, religious beliefs, or pregnancy. Promotion, content and delivery of the project will ensure that it does not stereotype and provides an open access to individuals who are interested in joining the project and one which is of interest to them.

3.6.    The project will provide flexibility to those who specific needs such as a disability or special educational needs, through allocating enhanced levels of resource to these groups and ensuring the content of delivery is adapted to meet different needs and where support equipment is required that this is made available to meet individual needs. Physical access to learning will be considered for those with disabilities and therefore arrangements will be made where this is required.
3.7.    The HeadStart Action programme is targeted at young people most at risk of becoming NEET in boroughs with the highest levels of youth unemployment. It supports young people through mentoring to create their own community projects and social action in order to engage and inspire young people, develop life skills, and provide the employer experience and connections they need to get ahead in the world of work. 
 

4.1.    Key risks and issues

Links to Mayoral strategies and priorities
4.2.    Activity directly contributes to the NDYP COVID-19 recovery mission that by 2024, all young people in need will be entitled to a personal mentor and all young Londoners will have access to quality local youth activities.
4.3.    Activity also contributes to the Mayor’s priority of providing more opportunities to young people:
4.3.1.    This programme will support social integration by:
•    providing opportunities for young people to interact with young people from different backgrounds through social action activity
•    allow young people to feel greater engagement with their communities as a result of taking part in social action projects.
4.3.2.    This programme will support inclusion and social mobility by:
•    making sure social action provision is accessible to all, especially those from low-income backgrounds and at risk of exclusion
•    ensuring young people can use their experiences of social action to generate personal, character, and skill development
•    therefore, making young people more likely to be employed because of experience of social action.
4.3.3.    This programme will support community engagement and resilience by:
•    supporting young people to engage with their communities by becoming active citizens in their local area
•    enabling young people to feel greater self-efficacy within their communities
•    ensuring young people have the mechanisms and voice to affect change
•    supporting schools to increase their status as pillars of the community by generating more impact on their local areas
•    working with communities and civil society groups across London to encourage active participation in community and civic life from young Londoners
•    support more resilient communities via the impact of youth social action projects.

    Consultations and impact assessments 
4.4.    The GLA have consulted relevant groups and stakeholders when designing the new programmes. This includes working with teachers and young people in PRUs, both those inside and outside the existing programme, to assess need and gather feedback on the current programme.
4.5.    The programme is also built on the last two years of programme delivery, feedback from stakeholders, and communities during the pandemic. Based on this, the granting of funding (to schools and grassroot organisations) has been made a more prominent part of the programmes to build community capacity, resilience, and to support young people’s wider wellbeing. The GLA are also using a test and learn approach to this work to enable the programme to adapt as it runs.
4.6.    An external evaluation of the programme will be commissioned to be able to scrutinise outcomes and determine which programme elements are the most effective. Additionally, the #iwill Fund will require monitoring and evaluation of impact and proactive working with the independent #iwill learning hub.
4.7.    The GLA Civil Society and Sport Unit is currently a member of the #iwill Fund Advisory Board. 
4.8.    A Youth Advisory Board drawn from participants of the programmes will allow young people to feedback into the programme and young people will be involved in the bid assessment and scoring process.
4.9.    Due consideration has been given to potential conflicts of interest, with none found. 
 

5.1.    Approval is sought for:
5.1.1.    Receipt of £147,000 match funding from the #iwill Fund, administered by the National Lottery Community Fund as a contribution towards the costs of its Young Ambassadors programme 2022-23. 
5.1.2.    Expenditure of up to £329,000 on the Young Ambassador programme 2022-23 over two years, with a net cost to the GLA of £182,000 (consisting of £159,000 in 2022-23, and £23,000 in 2023-24).
5.1.3.    Receipt and expenditure of up to £505,000, which will contribute to the delivery of the HeadStart Action programme, for which expenditure of £900,000 was approved under cover of MD2885. HeadStart Action expenditure will now total £1,405,000 over three years, with a net cost to the GLA of £900,000 (consisting of £100,000 in 2021-22, £450,000 in 2022-23, and £350,000 in 2023-24.
5.2.    The Young Ambassadors programme will be funded from the Youth and Schools budget within the Civil Society & Sport Unit in the New Deal for Young People mission.
5.3.    The HeadStart Action programme will be funded from HeadStart Action budget within the Civil Society & Sport Unit in the New Deal for Young People mission.
5.4.    As this funding is multi-year, it is subject to available funding and there should be appropriate break clauses in the agreement.
 

6.1.    The foregoing sections of this report indicate that: 
6.1.1.    the decision requested of the Mayor concern the exercise of the GLA’s general power, failing within the GLA’s statutory powers to do such things considered to further or which are facilitative of, conducive or incidental to the promotion of social development 
6.1.2.    in formulating the proposals in respect of which a decision is sought, officers have complied with the Authority’s related statutory duties to:
•    pay due regard to the principle that there should be equality of opportunity for all people 
•    considers how the proposals will promote the improvement of health and persons, health inequalities between persons and contribute towards the achievement of sustainable development in the United Kingdom 
•    consult with appropriate bodies. 
6.2.    In taking the decisions requested, the Mayor must have due regard to the Public Sector Equality Duty – namely the need to eliminate discrimination, harassment, victimisation and any other conduct prohibited by the Equality Act 2010 and to advance equality of opportunity and foster good relations between persons who share a relevant protected characteristic (race, disability, gender, age, sexual orientation, religion) and persons who do not (section 149 of the Equality Act 2010). To this end, the Mayor should have particular regard to section 3 (above) of this report. 
6.3.    If the Mayor makes the decisions sought, officers must ensure that to the extent the expenditure concerns the:
•    award of grant funding, it is distributed fairly, transparently, in a manner which affords value for money and in accordance with the requirements of the GLA’s Contracts and Funding Code and grant funding recipients before a commitment to fund is made 
•    payment for services, those services are procured in liaison with TfL Procurement and in accordance with the GLA’s Contracts and Funding Code and contracts are put in place between and executed by the GLA and contractors before commencement of such services 
•    variation of current agreements that such variations are agreed, documented in accordance with the corresponding provisions of those agreements and executed by the GLA and the counterparty(ies) before any commitment to vary is made.