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As we began the year, we set out our strategic priorities, with a core focus on the early years, mental health and safety for children, young people and families. Our work is increasingly concerned with systems change; working with partners to challenge and disrupt the conditions, structures and power that uphold inequalities in outcomes and experiences for children and young people.
Read MoreThis year we’re doubling down to catalyse systemic change and tackle inequalities in three main areas. One key strategic priority that we are committed to focusing on is to promote children’s and young people’s health and wellbeing, using our collective knowledge, skills, and resources to navigate and better understand the role of local partnerships in making the prevention of poor health outcomes a reality.
Read MoreIn 2024, you’ll hear less about the ‘how’ and a lot more about the ‘why’. As a team, we’ll be steadfast and focused on tackling inequalities in the outcomes and experiences of children and young people and doing so via equitable approaches to advancing systemic change.
Read MoreDartington Service Design Lab partnered with University of Cambridge Centre for Research in Play in Education Development and Learning (PEDAL) to develop new virtual ways to support parents and children to engage in book sharing, which has traditionally been done face-to-face . We are now releasing the final report from this work and sharing our learning for others to put into practice.
Read MoreThere are many different approaches to producing a Theory of Change. It can be a tricky balancing act between bold ambition and feasibility. Go too big, and your Theory of Change feels unattainable and fails to become a useful tool. Get too boxed in by practicalities, and it feels uninspiring.
We’d argue for a Theory of Change to be useful, it must adopt an integrated approach. We talk about the strengths of an integrated approach in our strategy paper launched early last year. We have been attempting to further progress it ever since (with a lot of success, failure, and learning along the way).
Read MoreIn January 2021, we were funded by Catalyst and The National Lottery Community Fund COVID-19 Digital Reponse to run a 12-week research and design project focused on reaching families remotely, in partnership with five charity partners from across the country. The whole research and design process culminated in the ‘9 steps for reaching families remotely’ - services and practitioners struggling to reach and engage with digitally excluded people.
Read MoreDuring the Connecting Families project - Funded by Catalyst and The National Lottery Community Fund COVID-19 Digital Reponse, and supported by Design agency Shift - we’ll be following a specific Design Process. This is broken into five key phases. These sprint notes will reflect on our learning from each phase. This blog is all about the sprint 'Wrap-Up' phase.
Read MoreDuring the Connecting Families project - Funded by Catalyst and The National Lottery Community Fund COVID-19 Digital Reponse, and supported by Design agency Shift - we’ll be following a specific Design Process. This is broken into five key phases. These sprint notes will reflect on our learning from each phase. This blog is all about the sprint 'Develop' phase.
Read MoreDuring the Connecting Families project - Funded by Catalyst and The National Lottery Community Fund COVID-19 Digital Reponse, and supported by Design agency Shift - we’ll be following a specific Design Process. This is broken into five key phases. These sprint notes will reflect on our learning from each phase. This blog is all about the mid-sprint 'Develop' phase.
Read MoreDuring the Connecting Families project - Funded by Catalyst and The National Lottery Community Fund COVID-19 Digital Reponse, and supported by Design agency Shift - we’ll be following a specific Design Process. This is broken into five key phases. These sprint notes will reflect on our learning from each phase. This blog is all about the 'Define' phase.
Read MoreDuring the Connecting Families project - Funded by Catalyst and The National Lottery Community Fund COVID-19 Digital Reponse, and supported by Design agency Shift - we’ll be following a specific Design Process. This is broken into five key phases. These sprint notes will reflect on our learning from each phase. This blog is all about the 'Discover' phase.
Read MoreDuring the Connecting Families project - Funded by Catalyst and The National Lottery Community Fund COVID-19 Digital Response, and supported by Design agency Shift - we’ll be following a specific Design Process. This is broken into five key phases. These sprint notes will reflect on our learning from each phase. This blog is all about the 'Inception' phase.
Read MoreWith 71% of community organisations in some parts of the voluntary sector having moved to online delivery since the COVID-19 crisis began, digital exclusion has become an even bigger obstacle to engaging those most in need than it was before. This is a particularly pressing issue for Early Years services, who support many families living in financially vulnerable households without internet access. As England endures another lockdown, Dartington Service Design Lab [Dartington] is working with a number of charities and families to develop and test different ways of supporting early years services to reach digitally excluded families. Here’s how we intend to do it...t ways of supporting early years services to reach digitally excluded families. Here’s how we intend to do it...
Read MoreIn 2015, the Lab joined forces with the Family Nurse Partnership (FNP) National Unit to collaborate on the ‘ADAPT’ programme, the second generation of the FNP service aimed at improving outcomes for children and young parents and reducing inequalities. We set out to enhance the flexibility of the existing service and improve the efficiency of the programme. Five years after beginning the project, we are pleased to join FNP in launching the final report with all our many learnings and recommendations from the experience.
Read MoreAt Dartington, through experience we have learnt the importance and power of a visual depiction of data to communicate meaning. Done well, this can reduce barriers to understanding the data and address any imbalance between those who hold the information or evidence and those who are interested in understanding it. Here Keira Lowther and Daniel Ellis discuss the power of visualisations and show how they can help us understand systems.
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