Participation in Action: Young people with learning disabilities help spark change

Action for Kids runs a daycare centre for 30 young people aged 14 to 25. Three years ago, the charity received Big Lottery funding to develop participation tools for young people with learning disabilities, in partnership with a research and development organisation called the Rix Centre.

“We wanted to help young people increase their independence by making decisions using a variety of methodologies including multimedia and technology,” says Maureen Galvin, business development director at Action for Kids.

Project workers began by establishing which aspects of the daycare centre’s services young people could influence. The first idea was to allow the young people to choose what time to eat lunch. By hanging a chart on the wall, the young people were able to indicate their preference. “It sounds terribly ordinary, but when young people have been told all their lives to do things at a particular time, having the freedom to make a choice about when to go to lunch and which friend to go with, has a lot of ramifications,” explains Galvin.

Over time, the project became more elaborate and young people were trained to use audio and video equipment. Staff encouraged them to record what they were doing and post their contributions on an internal website. This allowed the young people to express their opinions and learn new skills, while staff also benefited from the constant feedback and ideas.

“It was a way of empowering them and different from working with them face-to-face,” says Galvin.

Redesigned services
Galvin says this communication led to some surprising changes. “We were taken aback by the vehemence of young people’s desire to be in paid employment,” says Galvin. Getting a paid job can be challenging for young people with complex needs, but since this was so important to the young people, the centre redesigned its services to accommodate their wishes. “We now have a worker who focuses on supporting young people into employment,” says Galvin.

Action for Kids has compiled the best tools from its project into an online resource for other organisations. Sparking Change provides a guide to appropriate technologies and software programmes that can help with participative approaches, activities and feedback. “I am so proud to be involved in Sparking Change and promoting participation in organisations,” says young service user Leon. His friend, Chinaelo, agrees: “I hope Sparking Change will help young people all over the country.”