Tackling childhood obesity through community research, learning and evaluation
Impact on Urban Health is an independent place-based health foundation committed to tackling complex health challenges across Lambeth and Southwark
Team:
Evaluation and Learning:
Genevieve Laurier
Jonathan Carmel
Community Research:
Shaun Danquah
Tyler Fox
Over the last three years, we’ve worked with Guys and St Thomas’ Charity, an independent place-based health foundation committed to tackling complex health challenges across Lambeth and Southwark.
Childhood obesity is one of the biggest health challenges in the London boroughs and since 2018, TSIP has been supporting research, learning and evaluation of the Charity’s childhood obesity programme which aims to improve children’s health in urban areas by tackling childhood obesity.
Learning and evaluation of Guy’s and St Thomas’ childhood obesity programme
Together with the Behavioural Insights Team and the Charity, TSIP co-designed an ‘impact scorecard’ - an evaluation framework which enables consolidation, comparison and forecasting of the impact of the programme across ten years. We provided direct support to over a dozen of the Charity’s delivery partners to help each of them in designing their evaluation approach, articulating their theory of change, gathering evidence and learning from their experiences.
Building on the impact scorecard, we have also been working with the Charity and its grantees to implement Socialsuite – an impact measurement and reporting platform built on Salesforce. To date, TSIP has helped to lay the foundations for Socialsuite by defining KPIs, measurement methods and learning approaches; we have piloted the platform with grantees by delivering tailored training sessions; and prepared for wider rollout by developing a phased plan.
Socialsuite will help the Charity to gather and visualise relevant programme data, so that they can understand progress towards meeting their long-term goals. It will include an interactive dashboard with funded projects' results as well as area-level data on childhood obesity.
Research at the heart of the community to understand influences on childhood obesity from the built environment
Guy’s and St Thomas’ Charity and Gehl, an urban design firm, were exploring ways to tackle childhood obesity and understand how children are driven unconsciously toward unhealthy eating habits. This project explored how public space and the built environment impacts our interaction with food and the decisions we make as consumers.
We wanted to factor in how the community relates to their environment and listen to often unheard voices to understand what changes might be needed. In early research stages, our community research team, made up of 16 local residents, helped us begin a conversation with residents in two neighbourhoods in Southwark, South London which grounded all the research in a local context.
Based on collective findings from all research, Gehl has designed a Neighbourhood Foodscape Strategy with a series of tactical and strategic concepts. These recommendations are intended to improve the public life and public space in Camberwell and Peckham Rye, and to create healthier everyday environments for young people. You can read more about this project from the perspective of our research team on our blog.
Working with Oasis Hub to evaluate the impact and progress of the Oasis Healthspace pilot
Oasis Hub Waterloo is a charity based in North Lambeth that aims to transform lives through community. Their network includes two local schools, a church, food bank, coffee house, children’s centre, debt advice centre and farm. With funding from Guys and St Thomas’ Charity and Battersea Power Station Foundation, they set up the Healthspace programme in order to tackle childhood obesity and improve nutrition in the local area. The Healthspace programme involved interventions at Oasis primary and secondary schools, which targeted the school-aged population, their families and ultimately the community.
As the evaluation and learning partner for the Oasis Healthspace pilot, TSIP was responsible for helping Oasis to improve Healthspace on an ongoing basis, and for testing the effectiveness of each strand of work. We gathered data through observations, interviews, learning logs, surveys, sales data, physical activity monitoring, height and weights measurements. The evaluation team engaged with children, parents, school staff and key stakeholders at the Oasis Hub and in the community.
Off the back of the learnings from this pilot programme, Oasis Hub has introduced a new multi-year scheme that will go beyond the pilot schools to involve the wider community and neighbourhood.