ECOTEC News

Transforming Large Housing Estates

webmaster@ecotec.com — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 15:06:00 GMT

New research from CIH and the consultancy ECOTEC highlights the importance of tackling multiple sources of deprivation over the long term, as well as improving homes and the physical environment.

The report draws on experiences in four major estate transformation projects in Meden Valley in the Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire coal field, North Solihull, Huyton in Knowsley and Poplar HARCA in Tower Hamlets.

Click here to read the full report.

ECOTEC creates 'Our Work in Focus' brochure

webmaster@ecotec.com — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 13:56:00 GMT

ECOTEC have put together a collection of photos and stories showcasing their work over the past 12 months.
Click here to open a copy of this brochure.

Funding Support Service brochure

webmaster@ecotec.com — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 11:05:00 GMT

ECOTEC's Funding Support Service brings together over 25 years of skills and expertise to clients seeking to secure finance for their projects and programmes.

Click here to download the full brochure.

Preventing Childhood Obesity Seminar

webmaster@ecotec.com — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 09:28:00 GMT

The rising level of obesity among children and adolescents in Europe represents a major challenge for policy-makers. In response to this large scale programmes have been implemented in many European countries aiming to tackle the issue of obesity at the community level. Innovative approaches have been focussed on altering the obesogenic environment and on mobilising whole communities to change their health behaviours, diet and physical activity in particular.

Each country has its own unique approach to childhood obesity prevention reflecting culture,values and national policy and priorities. However, it is widely recognised that sharing good practice, exchanging ideas and research findings are valuable in the search for the most effective approaches to prevention.

Using three examples of high profile European initiatives that seek to prevent childhood obesity this seminar aims to stimulate discussion and debate around contemporary approaches to prevention across Europe, and to offer an opportunity for cross-national comparisons in relation to effectiveness and innovative approaches.

This seminar provides an opportunity to learn about approaches that have been used in three European countries and to join in the discussion and debate around approaches, key issues and effectiveness.

Seminar Information:

Click here to view the seminar flyer.
Click here to read more about ECOTEC's evaluation of childhood obesity prevention policies.
Click here to visit the seminar website on ecorys.com

ECORYS starts new company in Africa

webmaster@ecotec.com — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 14:35:00 GMT

14 September 2009

- PRESS RELEASE –

In July 2009 ECORYS established a new company in Polokwane, South Africa under the name of ECORYS Africa. The Managing Director of ECORYS Africa is Dr Elizabeth Omoluabi.

ECORYS has chosen Polokwane, because the Limpopo region, which is located in the North of South Africa, has significant growth potential and is conveniently located for working with clients in Pretoria and Johannesburg and in three of the countries that share a border with South Africa i.e. Mozambique, Botswana and Zimbabwe. This confirms our Africa focus.

In the coming years ECORYS expects to work on a range of issues which are important for the future of the region, including population and health research, service delivery, water management, and foreign direct investment in the mining industry, agriculture and tourism development. Moreover, ECORYS Africa will offer policy research, policy monitoring and management services with a focus on leadership training and governance and local and regional economic development.

Dr Elizabeth Omoluabi (1963) holds a PhD in Demography from the Institut de Démographie de l’Université de Paris I (IDUP). She has been active as an international consultant for 24 years, working in Africa and Europe. Her expertise includes management, design, monitoring and evaluation of large development projects, institutional assessment, and social and economic data analysis. She has worked on projects for clients such as the European Commission, UNDP, UNFPA, South African Social Security Agency, Human Sciences Research Council, South Africa; IBE Consulting, Belgium; DFID Sudan and DFID UK.

During her career, Dr. Omoluabi has published many papers and won several international awards including the Rockefeller Foundation student award, the Lavoisier award (France) and fellowships from the Population Council, Southampton University, the HSRC, and recently, the University of Limpopo.

- END PRESS RELEASE -

Red Review 2009 now available online

webmaster@ecotec.com — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 13:58:00 GMT

RedReview is the flagship Regeneration & Economic Development review published by ECOTEC Research & Consulting.

Edited by Gary Lawson, RedReview is driven by the need to illustrate the type of robust analysis needed in an economic environment where there is ongoing actual and potential change.

The 2009 edition of Red Review is now available online - click here to download the PDF.

ECOTEC Social Policy Division in the News

webmaster@ecotec.com — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 15:47:00 GMT

Play Scheme benefits deprived and disabled children. By Ross Watson
Children & Young People Now - 11 August 2009

Local authorities have increased play opportunities for deprived and disabled children as a result of a £123m Big Lottery-funded play programme, according to the latest research. The findings were revealed in an evaluation of the Big Lottery Fund's Children's Play Programme, which has provided three-year grants to local authorities to establish free, unstructured play for children from deprived or traditionally hard-to-reach communities.

Since its inception in 2006, the programme has funded 1,400 council-led projects. Research and consultancy firm Ecotec has been assessing the impact of the programme since 2008, as part of a three-year evaluation. Early findings, published last week, show that 82 per cent of projects funded by the programme have increased the number of children and young people accessing play.

It also suggested that children and young people are benefiting from a wider range of play provision, including sensory play, natural or adventurous play. However, the evaluation also suggested that many projects may struggle to remain sustainable once funding has expired, as local authorities do not have enough staff committed solely to play.

The evaluation also highlighted a number of challenges. These include providing free and unstructured play for disabled children without additional support, and negotiating levels of risk in play within local authorities.

Adrian Voce, director of Play England, said he was delighted the evaluation had highlighted the benefits of the programme. But he urged local authorities to resist the temptation to cut play provision while money is tight.

"We want to highlight the importance now of local authorities embedding a commitment to funding play provision into the future within their mainstream budgets," he said.

The full, original article can be seen on the 'Children & Young People Now' website here.

Early findings of Children's Play Programme launched

webmaster@ecotec.com — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 10:04:00 GMT

Early findings from ECOTEC's evaluation of the Big Lottery Fund's Children's Play Programme are launched today in a new national report and newsletter. Key findings so far are that the programme is allowing more children to access more play than they had been able to access before and to access new forms of play (e.g. sensory play, natural or adventurous play) than were previously available.

The programme supports a concept of 'free play' where children are encouraged to undertake self determined play for its own sake. The programme is particularly targeting disabled children, rural areas and disadvantaged areas. It is helping disadvantaged children such as those living in isolated areas where services cannot usually be delivered, or those with disabilities, to access play.

The programme supports 'risky play' such as adventurous or physical play and managing risk effectively has been a key challenge for local authorities delivering the programme.

For the full report see: http://www.biglotteryfund.org.uk/ecotec_eval_280509.pdf

http://ecotec.com/theme/children--young-people/evaluation-of-children's-play-programme-for-big-lottery-fund.aspx

The evaluation runs from August 2008 to August 2011.

Our research on 'at home' learning published by DCSF

webmaster@ecotec.com — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 11:31:00 GMT

ECOTEC have recently completed a large-scale action research project for the Families Analysis Team at the Department for Children, Schools and Families (DCSF).

The project aimed to identify ways that schools can support parents with their children's learning and development at home, and the associated outcomes.

The final research report and practitioner guide have been published by the DCSF as part of their Research Series. The set of reports are available on the DCSF Research Portal:

- Research Summary
- Full Report
- Guide for Practitioners

ECOTEC appoints new MD for RED Division

webmaster@ecotec.com — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 09:57:00 GMT

The ECOTEC Board has appointed Paul Jeffrey as Managing Director for the Regeneration and Economic Development Division. His first day in post will be 3 August 2009.

Previously, Paul headed ECOTEC's housing team, which is now managed by Danny Friedman.

Click here to view the full press release.

Evaluation of Children's Play programme for Big Lottery Fund

webmaster@ecotec.com — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 15:05:00 GMT

The Children's Play programme forms part of the Big Lottery Fund's £155 million Children's Play initiative. The initiative is all about helping to improve and develop free local play spaces and opportunities for children throughout England. Local authorities, delivery agents and other stakeholders are working in partnership to deliver the programme.

ECOTEC has been commissioned to evaluate the programme over 3 years, to help understand how free play is being interpreted and to see who is benefiting from the programme activities so far.

Our methodology includes a mixture of baseline and follow up data analysis, surveys and case studies. We’re also using innovative techniques, such as participant diaries, disposable cameras and visioning exercises.

To find out more read our first report:

- Evaluation of Children's Play programme: Report to Big Lottery Fund (May 2009)
- Children's Play programme Evaluation Newsletter (Summer 2009)

The study is led by ECOTEC's Social Policy Division.

"Responding to Recession" Service

webmaster@ecotec.com — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 12:29:00 GMT

ECOTEC has published details of a new service, 'Responding to Recession'. Closely informed by recent project experience, 'Responding to Recession' is directed at helping policy makers and partner organisations develop a better understanding of how their areas may be expected to cope with the impacts of the recession and critically be positively positioned to respond to the opportunities from economic recovery.

The recession is a global phenomenon but one that can provide local opportunities, through an active response focused on nurturing 'global' businesses, developing competitive products and technologies, and building the skills base of the indigenous workforce.

To learn more about 'Responding to Recession', click here.

Helping with an inner city equalities action plan

webmaster@ecotec.com — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 09:10:00 GMT

We were commissioned to gather information to help refresh the equalities action plan for the Kings Norton New Deal for Communities (NDC) programme. NDC is a government-funded initiative set up to tackle deprivation in some of the UK’s poorest neighbourhoods. It has operated on the 3 estates of Kings Norton, an inner city area of Birmingham, since 1999.

Our work involved engaging with Kings Norton residents to get their views on what it’s like to be part of the 3 estates community and to find out how the New Deal for Communities activities have affected them so far.

In particular the client was interested in the experiences of non-white groups and their level of community integration and involvement. The purpose here was also to provide the Kings Norton NDC team with a robust baseline to allow year on year trend analysis on any progress made in terms of community cohesion.

We were also tasked to find out if people’s sexuality affected their experience of living in the community and to get a detailed picture of the experiences of ex-offenders living on the 3 estates.

The methodology involved a desk based review of existing data and an on-street survey with residents. We also conducted interviews and focus groups with ex-offenders and with stakeholders representing members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender communities.

Read our full report to find out more

ECOTEC wins Open University Business School Award

webmaster@ecotec.com — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 07:53:00 GMT

The Open University's Centre for Professional Learning and Development Award for the most innovative use of case studies in e-learning was presented to ECOTEC Research and Consulting Limited for its 'Summer Arts College' initiative.

These innovative national programmes, developed by ECOTEC on behalf of the Youth Justice Board, Arts Council England and the Welsh Assembly Government provided young people in the youth justice system with a unique opportunity to experience a wide range of creative arts and to work alongside practitioners in a range of art forms, from photography to dance and creative writing to music.

Practitioners on the projects were filmed explaining their experiences, as well as the challenges and outcomes of the initiative. This then fed into the development of online training resources to guide project managers and practitioners in delivering future Summer Arts Colleges. ECOTEC Director Martin Stephenson said:

"We are very grateful to have had the opportunity to work in partnership with the Youth Justice Board and the Open University in designing these tremendous elearning resources which have facilitated our delivery of quality, national programmes benefiting hundreds of young people".

Evaluation of national money advice programme

webmaster@ecotec.com — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 16:04:00 GMT

ECOTEC and the Personal Finance Research Centre (PFRC) at the University of Bristol were commissioned by the Legal Services Commission to evaluate aspects of a national money advice programme.

The Money Advice Outreach Programme, funded by HM Treasury over three years (2005-2008), was all about how best to deliver money advice to financially excluded individuals. The programme ran 22 local pilot projects across the UK, with the aim of reaching areas or groups that face financial exclusion.

The initial commission was to provide a qualitative evaluation of the pilots that focused on the provider perspective.

Our methods included:

- a documentary analysis of the policy and strategic context;
- a review of the pilot documents;
- sampling of 8 pilots for in-depth case studies; and
- a fieldwork phase to conduct depth interviews with project managers, staff and outreach workers.

Again working with the PFRC, we took up a second commission to evaluate the client outcomes from programme. The evaluation aimed to establish clients' motivations for advice-seeking; their views on the effectiveness of referral and the delivery of advice, and the main types of outcomes achieved.

The methodology comprised in-depth qualitative interviews with 41 clients and 8 non-recipients of advice, conducted at a range of different outreach locations and via home interviewing.

For more information read our final reports:

ECOTEC appoint new Chair

webmaster@ecotec.com — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 09:45:00 GMT

Chris Ralph has been appointed as the next Chair of ECOTEC Research and Consulting Limited and as a member of the ECORYS group’s Board of Management.

The appointment was confirmed at the ECORYS Annual General Meeting on 20 May in Rotterdam and Chris will formally begin his new role on 1 July 2009.

"I am clearly looking forward to the challenge of this exciting and new role” said Chris. “In particular I look forward to working with the excellent talent within the company to secure its continued growth and enhance its already strong reputation as a provider of public policy consulting, programme management and research support. Central to this will be further consolidation of our position in the UK market, developing our work for the European Commission and expanding into new international markets.”

With nine years at ECOTEC behind him, across a variety of positions including his current role as Managing Director of the Research and Economic Development Division, Chris’s wealth of experience make him the right person to lead the company’s continued growth.

Housing division restructured

webmaster@ecotec.com — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 09:25:00 GMT

ECOTEC Research and Consulting's housing division has been restructured and has recruited new staff. Danny Friedman now heads up the team. James Beale (who has housing strategy, enabling and development experience at various local authorities, Servite Houses and as a freelance consultant), Jeff Bishop (previously at Barratt East London, Fairview, various local authorities and a freelance consultant) and James Donagh (formerly at DTZ, Meridienpure and Amtek) have joined as senior and principal consultants.

New Reaching Communities evaluation report

webmaster@ecotec.com — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 15:31:00 GMT

ECOTEC have been commissioned by the Big Lottery Fund (BIG) to evaluate the Reaching Communities Programme in England and Northern Ireland.

We've just published the year two evaluation report and you can download if from the Reaching Communities evaluation website.
- Read evaluation report.
- Visit the Reaching Communities evaluation website.

ECOTEC's evaluation will run for another two years and is helping BIG to look in more detail at how local needs are being identified and met via the programme.

We deliver European Commission programme in Turkey

webmaster@ecotec.com — Wed, 20 May 2009 12:11:00 GMT

The aim of the European Commission’s Information and Communications Support Programme in Turkey is to facilitate Turkey's accession process by providing information to the Turkish people.

ECOTEC is responsible for delivering the programme in Turkey on behalf of our client, the European Commission. The programme aims to improve public understanding of the European Union and explain the accession process in Turkey.

To meet these aims ECOTEC have established a programme management office in Ankara, run the EU Information Centre in Istanbul and set up a second EU information Centre in Ankara.

The EU Information Centres we run represent the public face of the European Commission in Turkey. They offer information on the entire range of EU activities and serve as major centres for information and events aimed at thousands of visitors every year. The centres undertake a wide range of activities including events, workshops, press conferences and exhibitions.

Our programme management office in Ankara provides the strategic oversight of all the activities. This includes the overall co-ordination, technical and financial management of all elements of the programme.

ECOTEC's research, consulting and management experience can help you develop and deliver your programme strategy, maximise impact, ensure spend targets are met and minimise risk. Find out more about our programme management expertise.

How schools can support parents with their children's learning

webmaster@ecotec.com — Wed, 13 May 2009 13:11:00 GMT

ECOTEC have recently completed a large-scale action research project for the Families Analysis Team at the Department for Children, Schools and Families (DCSF).

The project aimed to identify ways that schools can support parents with their children's learning and development at home, and the associated outcomes.

The project involved an action research methodology; to pair-up local authorities and schools from different local areas within England, with the aim of exchanging good practice for supporting parents; and to measure the outcomes for parents and children through data collection and sets of in-depth qualitative interviews.

Following a snapshot survey and review of the research literature, five good practice schemes and twelve schools participated. The different models included:

- curriculum workshops;
- educational home visits;
- community arts and literacy;
- law and citizenship education;
- Family SEAL; and
- whole school approaches.

Working with our project partners - the National Institute of Adult Continuing Education (NIACE) and JB Associates we expect the final research report to be published by the DCSF in the Summer of 2009.

Look out for more news on this project, including the project website and workshops.

To find out more read the project newsletter (April 2009 edition).