Our learning partnership with Coram in Wigan

Understanding learnings from our expansion to Wigan      

We have appointed Coram Impact and Evaluation (Coram) as our learning partner to help us understand the lessons we can learn and share from the delivery of our initial, two-year Impact Programme in Wigan; our first  outside of London. The project will enhance our understanding of the impact of the programme on children and young people, as well as the wider impact on families, schools, the local authority, and the local voluntary, community and social enterprise sector (VCSE).     

We began working with 250 children and young people, across seven schools, in the Leigh area of Wigan in September 2024, and will be supporting a further 150-200 children in Atherton and Tyldesley from September 2025. The launch of the programme in Wigan followed an eighteen-month process of co-design, where we worked with the Local Authority, schools, VCSE organisations, children and families to understand their needs and identify priorities for the programme. Their priorities included:  

• Improving child mental health - Leigh has the highest rate of referrals to CAMHS in Greater Manchester
• Improving school attendance
• Reducing suspensions and exclusions from school
• Working in partnership with the Council’s Early Help provision to strengthen early intervention and prevention services for families.

Our launch in Wigan presents a unique opportunity to gain insights as to how our Impact Programme responds to different places and local needs, and the learning partnership will help us distill these insights, enabling us to better serve our existing locations and derive insights for potential future expansion.   

Coram’s Impact and Evaluation team works with public sector, commercial and third sector organisations to enable them to deliver better outcomes for children. They are dedicated to using robust and collaborative research approaches to create the best services and support for children, young people and their families.

Understanding the research partnership

Key questions guiding our evaluation

As part of our learning partnership, we have developed seven key research questions aligned with  our  evaluation objectives. These questions explore:         

• Lessons from implementing the Link Worker programme in a new geographic context
• The short and long-term impact of the programme on children, families, and service providers
• Stakeholder perspectives on multi-agency collaboration and early help systems
• Insights into best practices for scaling and replicating the intervention

Laying the foundations: Our work so far

Co-designing the learning partnership with stakeholders

During an action learning session in October, the Coram and AllChild team outlined creativity, collaboration and a child-centered approach as the key values that would drive the partnership. In addition to this, it was agreed that honest communication and reflective practice would be key to generating implementable feedback. After various iterations and feedback from All Child’s staff and Link Workers based in schools, a Theory of Change was co-produced.

To evaluate impact, Coram will use contribution analysis¹ to assess the claims outlined in the programme’s Theory of Change. As part of the process evaluation, Coram will conduct interviews and focus groups with key stakeholders. Guided by a participatory approach, they also will be engaging participants in creative evaluation sessions. They will gather quantitative data at baseline and endline to track changes in CYP outcomes using the My Voice Survey. The evidence generated across the mixed method evaluation will be used to test the validity of these claims while building in the wider context of the Wigan area. 

In the second year of the partnership, Coram will investigate the emerging impact on stakeholders and beneficiaries using surveys. The cost benefit analysis, in addition to the contribution analysis, will be key to assessing the economic efficiency of the programme and will support informed decision making for service commissioners.

Children's Voices at the heart of the evaluation

Empowering peer researchers

The partnership’s participatory approach places young people at the heart of the research process by onboarding them as peer researchers. This evaluation’s peer researchers will be young people from the Leigh and Atherton area, who will be trained to take on a range of active roles across the research process, from co-developing tools to conducting interviews and focus groups. Peer researcher training will cover key research techniques, ethical considerations, and facilitation skills, ensuring they are well-prepared to take on their roles.

This approach aims to mitigate traditional research power dynamics as young people may feel more comfortable sharing their experiences with peers from similar backgrounds rather than with external researchers, leading to richer and more authentic insights. As part of the recognition of the vital role they play in shaping the evaluation, all peer researchers will be paid for their time and given ongoing support and training.

Children and Young People Advisory Group

Alongside peer researchers, a separate Children and Young People Advisory Group will provide structured feedback and guidance on the evaluation process. The Advisory Group will review the creative evaluation tools, offer insights into data analysis, and help shape the dissemination of findings to ensure they are as child-centred and accessible as possible. The group will meet at key stages of the evaluation providing an additional opportunity for young people to refine their research and facilitation skills in a practical setting. The findings will inform the future development of AllChild’s Impact Programme, specifically ensuring that it remains responsive to the needs of young people in new geographic contexts.

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Spending time in Wigan

Understanding local insights from Link Workers and the Wigan Council

As part of the evaluation of AllChild’s expansion in Wigan, the Coram team visited the Leigh and Atherton to engage with local stakeholders and gain insight into the programme’s delivery context. A key component of this visit was a session with Link Workers, where the team gathered perspectives on the opportunities and challenges Link Workers have encountered in their early work with children and families. These discussions provided useful information on the realities of service provision in Leigh and Atherton, including the factors that facilitate or hinder effective support for young people. In addition to this session, researchers from Coram attended The Wigan Experience, an event hosted by Wigan Council that aims to communicate the council’s organisational vision and strategic approach to service transformation.  

Attending The Wigan Experience provided Coram researchers helpful context for the evaluation by offering insight into the council’s broader strategic direction on asset-based service models. Understanding this context is particularly relevant as local authority priorities and ways of working can influence programme integration and delivery. These insights will contribute to the evaluation framework and the ongoing analysis of how AllChild’s approach aligns with, and responds to the local service landscape.

Establishing the Evaluation Steering Group

Ensuring rigorous, ethical, and effective research

Coram have also recruited an Evaluation Steering Group to independently guide and oversee their evaluation of the AllChild Impact Programme in Wigan. Comprised of academics, sector experts, and Wigan-specific stakeholders, the group plays a key role in ensuring that the evaluation is rigorous, ethical, and methodologically sound. The Evaluation Steering Group’s role includes advising on evaluation plans, critically reviewing progress, and reflecting on the approaches, tools, and findings throughout the study. Additionally, the group will monitor potential risks and adverse events, offering guidance on mitigation strategies where necessary. 

Next steps

Milestones and future learnings from the partnership

With these foundational elements in place, the evaluation will move into its first phase, which will focus on process evaluation and understanding how AllChild is adapting to the Wigan context. This phase will involve engagement with key stakeholders to gather insights into the programme’s set-up and implementation as well as early emerging impacts.

AllChild and Coram are excited to collaborate in the development of the Impact Programme which strives to guarantee that more children and young people across the UK are given the opportunity to reach their potential. As part of this partnership’s reflective approach, this piece is the first update of many to be shared across the two-year partnership.

¹ Contribution analysis is a method used to systematically gauge the influence of an intervention on target outcomes. This includes judging whether existing evidence is consistent with what has been established in the intervention’s theory of change. From this, the theory can be revised to build in evidence from any other contributory factors.