Community building through physical activity: An evaluation for Oasis Hub

BACKGROUND

Oasis Hub Waterloo is a charity based in Waterloo, London that focuses on community transformation and community building. They received funding from Sport England to get families in the Waterloo area to be more active. The Social Innovation Partnership started working with Oasis Hub Waterloo in January 2020 until December 2022 to evaluate the impact of their programme in the local community.

The project objectives of Oasis Hub are “to support families from lower socio-economic groups to be more active, more often.” The basic model of delivery for this programme was regular activity in local settings for families using a variety of delivery methods to see what suited the families and led to greater attendance. The other main delivery method was school holiday programmes with activities organised for both adults and children. A robust monitoring and evaluation protocol was set up to cover this reporting period by TSIP and our partners, Middlesex University.

Our findings capture the value and impact that Oasis Hub has on the lives of local community members. It serves to proactively improve physical health and literacy of families and build vital connections that strengthen the community. Another Oasis Hub in Worcestershire was also a part of this project to see if using this model of delivery could be replicated. Oasis Hub Warndon delivered activity as part of the project from February 2022 to November 2022.

Methodology

For this evaluation, we used a mixed methods evaluation, including both qualitative and quantitative tools to understand the impact of Oasis Hub.

Below you can see the various types of methods we employed:

Surveys - Middlesex University conducted three surveys with the Waterloo Hub and two with the Warndon Hub to gain a wider set of responses around people’s experiences with Oasis Hub.

Observations - the Middlesex team conducted observations of sessions, please see the following slides for further details.

Focus Groups - over the two year period we conducted four focus groups with parents and children who participated in Oasis Hub activities. These groups allowed for parents to come together and interact with one another around their mutual experiences.

Interviews - we held thirteen interviews with parents in late 2021 to give us a more nuanced understanding of their experiences, and one interview with an Oasis Hub coach.

Reflection Sessions - we facilitated reflection sessions with the Oasis Hub team to create a space to reflect on the progress and obstacles that accompanied the Hub’s activity. We found this space crucial to allow for creative thought around areas for improvement and recommendations.

Importantly, we had the support of an Oasis service user - Raquel - who often takes her children to the Oasis programmes. Raquel helped shape the research piece, conduct focus groups, interviews and analysis. Raquel’s positionality and experience at the Hub was crucial to the success of this project.

Findings:

Oasis Hub Waterloo provides a vital and impactful service to local residents in the area. It is one of the few available free services for families to improve their physical health literacy and activity - this is increasingly crucial as the cost of living increases, leaving many families unable to afford activities for their children.

There are clear benefits to the local community, enriching the lives of children, parents and carers:

Activities are an excellent opportunity for children and families to have new experiences
Children’s confidence has been enhanced to make new friends and engage in new activities
Oasis benefits from creating spaces for social connectedness and building relationships that enhance community
Oasis has improved the diversity of the families they provide activities for and reaches members of the community who have previously not taken part in physical activity

With further funding, there are clear areas in which Oasis Hub could invest to meet the demands of the local community:

Improve communication around the programmes
Increase Oasis staffing
Introduce a new booking system
Increase the variety of activities available
Increase additional timings/longer sessions

We look forward to seeing the future of the Oasis programme!