CREATE Project Bulletin – October 31, 2018

October 31, 2018

WHAT’S BEEN HAPPENING

From the Director’s Desk – Professor Ross Homel (Co-Director):

Last month I presented some of the methodology behind the Deciding Together stage of the CREATE Change Engine, with a particular focus on how we plan to create child risk and protective factor scores at the suburb (SA2) level. This process is critically dependent on Rumble’s Quest data, as well as on data from the AEDC. Even a few weeks ago we were optimistic that we would have preliminary data to share with CfC community coalitions before the end of this year, but – alas- this is not to be.

This month saw invitations go out to all 148 Queensland public school principals in the 9 CfC regions, inviting them to participate in the CREATE Project and in particular use Rumble’s Quest. This was a major milestone, and one that members of the research team, InVision and the Department have been working towards for over a year now. We are very grateful for the efforts of Queensland Department of Education staff in helping to us get to this critical milestone, and already many schools have signed up.

Unfortunately, despite strenuous efforts by our colleagues in the NSW Department of Education, we learned last week that the Department has decided to hold the planned Rumble’s Quest personnel briefing in the new year, meaning that principals in NSW will not be invited to participate in the Project and use Rumble’s Quest until early in Term 1. Being realistic, and acknowledging the time of the year, it is likely that many Queensland schools will also not use Rumble’s Quest until Term 1 next year, although they do have the advantage of being able to work through the induction module this year so they can ‘hit the ground running’ early in Term 1.

The flow on effect of these delays in making Rumble’s Quest available to schools, especially in NSW, is that Deciding Together cannot now happen until Term 2 of next year, one year later than we had originally planned. Deciding Together is the project stage that is most critically dependent on a range of partners and data providers, and the process has taken much longer than all of us ever imagined. The time it has taken to get to this point is due to a number of organisational processes, such as the process to obtain AEDC data from AEDC custodians the Social Research Centre at the ANU. Our request for AEDC item data was been approved and paid for some time ago (after nearly one year of negotiation), but we are still waiting to receive the spreadsheets. Fortunately, the later stages of the CREATE Change Engine cycle (Planning Together, Doing Together, and Reviewing Together) involve processes that are more site-specific, not being reliant on external factors or partners.

One of the major learnings we and many of our partners are taking away from this project is that its multiple interdependencies can act as a major brake on progress. The general lesson is that attempting any type of change through collaboration is challenging, and that timeframes need to be both realistic and actively managed. But then, it’s easy to be wise after the event!

One last word – because we are moving closer to the end of the year, November will be the final newsletter for 2018 and the Q&A in November will be the final Q&A. The newsletters will recommence at the end of February, 2019.

CREATE Executive Committee (CEC): The newly reformed CEC met on the 2nd of October. The minutes from the meeting can be found on the Project Management Portal (CREATE Executive Oversight Committee (CEOC) -> Meetings Agendas and Minutes).

At this meeting Dr Geoff Woolcock nominated and was appointed as the new chair. Geoff was featured in the July RoundUP and represents Logan Together (Trustee for Logan Child Friendly Charitable Trust) on the project. No nominations for the Deputy Chair position were made. It was resolved that Geoff and Ross Homel would meet and approach potential Deputy Chairs. The current membership of the CEC was agreed to, along with the Governance diagram.

Feedback from members regarding the Terms of Reference for the CEC are being incorporated by the Secretariat and will be sent out to CEC members for approval and then posted to the Project Management Portal.

In relation to the Communications Plan, the Secretariat will incorporate feedback into the plan and send it back to CEC members to be finalised. The Program Management Plan was also discussed. Ross Homel will go through the Program Management Plan with Richard Davey to identify where further input is required and will approach members for input where it is needed. A working group may be formed to help finalise this document.
The creation of the Sustainability Group was held over for discussion at the next CEC.

The CEC will meet next on Tuesday, December 4th.

Contributions Welcome – Contributions from project partners to the RoundUP are welcome. If you have an idea for a feature, event or just something that made you smile please contact Sara Branch (s.branch@griffith.edu.au) for inclusion in future RoundUPs.

 

FEATURE – PROJECT ELEMENT

Data Linkage
Ross Homel

This feature focuses on the data linkage and integration exercise in Logan that was outlined in the successful ARC application. Steady progress is being made on the technical feasibility of using DEX data and assessing the quality of data available for linking. Below is a general summary of this component of the CREATE Project and will be the focus of discussion at the next Q&A.

Proposal Overview and Rationale: Stated in its simplest form, the data linkage exercise seeks to relate data on a range of outcomes for children (such as their classroom behavior) to participation in programs or services designed to improve their wellbeing. These services or programs can be delivered by schools, or by community agencies funded by CfC or by the state government. Child participation can be direct, or indirect through parents or other family members. The outcome measures in this project are all derived from primary school records or directly from children or teachers at school, capitalizing on the fact that primary schools constitute a near-universal platform for data collection.

The key research questions related to this project include:

  • Do all these services have a beneficial, collective, measurable effect on children?
  • If so, what can be concluded about the effects of different program mixes or types, their duration, and their intensity, on a range of outcomes for various kinds of children?
  • What evidence is there for the separate impact on children of school-based, CfC, or state funded family support services?
  • Can the effects of investment in the Griffith-Prevention and Translation Support System be discerned?

The linkage and integration process is intended to be repeated at least once in the life of the CREATE project, so that changes in patterns of service participation can be related to changes in outcomes. Ideally the linkage would be repeated several times for a cohort of children, making the data truly longitudinal.

The project seeks to include participation data (nature of program, program duration, frequency of contact) from three sources: Communities for Children (via the Data Exchange System (DEX); Schools implement a range of programs for children or families, directed at behaviour, wellbeing, or poverty-related issues; State government-funded family support services, designed to help prevent children at risk from falling into the child protection system. Child outcome measures (ages 5-12) will include: Rumble’s Quest (featured in last month’s RoundUP); The Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire. SDQ is a widely used 25-item behavioural screening scale used by teachers to score children’s behavioural problems (20 items) and prosocial behaviors (5 items); NAPLAN results: Grades 3, 5, 7 standardised national testing outcomes for literacy and numeracy; and School Attendance and Suspension/Exclusion data.

The benefits of data linkage: Linking data on individual child outcomes and program participation across sectors enables:

  1. Detailed analysis of how patterns of participation are related to different outcomes, for children of varying characteristics;
  2. Increased statistical power to evaluate interventions over aggregate-level analyses; and
  3. Construction of matched control groups of school children not receiving any services.

This methodology was pioneered successfully in one Brisbane community through the Pathways to Prevention Project, which led to the construction of a longitudinal database of nearly 5,000 children from seven schools over a 10-year period.

Legal and ethical issues: It is important to keep in mind that the kinds of applications of data linking systems described above must adhere to privacy and legal obligations concerning the disclosure or sharing of information. Most fundamentally, parents must give their informed consent for their children to be included in a data linking system, and principals must agree to participate in such a scheme.

The proposed method of data linkage: For this project we propose that data linkage be carried out by one of the three national Accredited Data Integrating Authorities, since each has the capacity and legislative protections to securely manage Commonwealth data linked to data from other sources. The data integration facility would receive data separately from the three data suppliers (Logan primary schools/ Qld Education Department; the Logan CfC coalition via DEX; and the QLD Department of Child Safety, Youth and Women), and then carry out the linking process.

Data records, once matched, would be identified via a child code, a global unique identifier (GUID) which is a unique randomly generated number that is held alongside the child’s name only by the data integration facility. The de-identified data records are then stored by the agency in an encrypted form. These procedures ensure that personally identifiable information is never able to be revealed outside the group of authorized personnel in the data integration authority. None of the data suppliers, or the researchers, would ever receive matched data that includes the name of the child or any other information that could allow the identification of any child.

The Next Steps:

  1. Pending finalisation of our data linkage partner, we will continue to work with AIFS. We are grateful for the feedback that Mr Tenniel Guiver, Director of Data Linkage and Integration for AIFS, has provided thus far.
  2. Consideration by the Logan Data Linkage Working Group of the Data Linkage and Integration Project in Logan: Overview, progress report, and proposal for next steps document (posted to the Project Management Portal 22-8-18)
  3. The Working Group will need to take responsibility for the preparation and submission of an ethics application through the on-line Human Research Ethics Application process administered by the NH&MRC. This will most likely not occur until early next year.

 

THINGS THAT MADE US SMILE THIS MONTH

This is where we share great things to read, listen to, attend and more! Let us know if you discover anything you would like us to share in our next newsletter.

Invitations to participate in the project and in particular use Rumble’s Quest went out to Queensland Public Schools: As noted above, this month the email invitation was issued to Queensland public schools to participate in the project and in particular to use Rumble’s Quest and share their statistical data with the project.

 

UPCOMING MEETINGS AND EVENTS

CREATE Q&A Teleconference: Members of the project team are available at a Q&A teleconference for anyone interested in continuing the conversation. Each month we will be discussing a specific topic. This time we will be focusing our discussion around the Data Linkage project as well as updating on progress with Rumble’s Quest. November’s Q&A details are:

2pm (Brisbane; 3pm Sydney) Tuesday November 27th

Call: 1 800 896 323 and enter Participant Code: 96583305#

 

WHAT’S NEW IN THE PROJECT MANAGEMENT PORTAL

(Items added in September)
Project Governance

  • CREATE Project Plenary Sydney 28 June 2018 – Summary (Adjusted October 2018) – posted 2-10-18
  • 2018 OCTOBER 2nd – CEC Minutes – posted 24-10-18

CIF Role – Updates to CIFs

  • Update to CIFs – Weeks from 15-10-18 to the 26-10-18 – posted 24-10-18

Project Updates – CIF Reports

  • 2018 September CIF REFLECTION REPORT – posted 22-10-18

Items of Interest

  • Reminder the following resources are available on the Project Management Portal:
    • Rumble’s Quest Induction Modules Preview
    • Coming Together Module Preview
    • Watch the Coalition Wellbeing Survey User Guide Video
    • What is the Coalition Wellbeing Survey Video

Communications

  • CREATE Project Bulletin – September 30, 2018 – posted September 30, 2018

Category:

Posted by admin

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *