This page has notes and ideas for planning HAF-funded sessions that are part of Fit for All. It is intended to be added to – so please send your thoughts and ideas…
Some points to consider when you are thinking through your HAF-funded sessions:
Fit for All is an inclusive programme – that is it provides holiday places for young people of all sorts. Last year, of the almost 2700 young people who took part, about 1500 had Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND). We also had a large number of children who are eligible for Free School Meals take part. And a fair number of children who are not recognised as having SEND, but who are vulnerable for all sorts of other reasons. Your group might focus on providing opportunities for disabled children. That doesn’t stop you involving siblings and friends. And it doesn’t stop you organising the occasional session designed to include the wider community, including of course, your SEND participants’ families and neighbours. So, think outisde the box when you are thinking of what you propose as part of your HAF-funded sessions; do bear inclusion in mind.
Fit for All is a flexible programme – it brings together different groups who work in different ways. Some groups work on the basis that parents attend sessions and some work on the basis they do not – and children are looked after by professional staff and skilled volunteers. Whichever you are, bear in mind that you can be flexible and do the opposite from time to time. If your model is that you pay for very high staff ratios (which HAF-funding doesn’t really cover) – think about including some sessions where fewer staff and more parents are included? If you are a parent-led group and work on the basis that parents attend sessions, then think about including some sessions which parents need not attend, but whoch are run by volunteers or paid staff? Over the course of the year, the programme will be advertising opportunities for groups to be flexible in the way you deliver Fit for All; if you want to vary your project delivery and need help to do so, please let us know?
Fit for All has space for anyone regardless of what you bring – so most of what we have said in this guidance is based on working with groups that have a venue, staff, participants and way of working. We’re also looking for partners who have enrichment offers; food offers; venues; staff and volunteers; and links with participants. You don’t have to have a fully formed poject – we are a cooperative programme; we help people put things together. You can be a school or special-school; you can be a community project for home-schooled children – our programme includes both. We have supported community-led projects to get going using HAF-funding. We’d love to support projects led by young people.
Fit for All is for vulnerable children too – by vulnerable we mean any child or young person that is part of one of the groups identified by the Children’s Commissioner for England as vulnerable. That includes: children who are looked after by the local authority; young refugees; children who have experienced domestic violence; children from families that are homeless and in temporary accommodation; children form families where a parent is suffering severe mental ill-health or there is substance abuse; children living in extreme poverty; young carers; the siblings of children with SEND; children to young, single parents and children with a social worker. The Fit for All programme has hourly rates for children with SEND and for children who are eligible for Free School Meals. Between these two categories is an hourly rate for vulnerable children (in terms we have described above) – groups should use this to contribute to the higher staff ratios needed to work effectively with children in need who do not have SEND.
Fit for All is not just HAF-funded – Fit for All began as the Children’s Quarter campaign for inclusive holiday clubs; we wanted to see equal access to inclusive holiday activities for disabled, special needs, vulnerable and disadvantaged children. Government HAF funding enabled Fit for All to develop from a campaign to a delivery programme. We thank and acknowledge the Government, Birmingham City Council, Bring it On Brum, Marcus Rashford – the footballer who was awarded an MBE for his work on school dinners – and others for their work on enabling this. Together, we work to extend opportunities for ALL children and young people. Fit for All – and the groups that make it – is not just a government-funded programme, however. We draw support also from business, communities, charities and parents and all of them provide the money, time and energy to provide sessions. When you plan your sessions, look around at where you might get support form; matching money and resources will be vital in making your scheme sustainable.
Fit for All sessions are free to attend, but – that doesn’t mean that they have to be free not-to-attend. It is really important that you don’t charge families who HAF-funded sessions are most aimed at to attend them. You can enable donations; you can include families whose children are not SEND, vulnerable or FSM eligible (and you can charge them or ask them for childcare vouchers). You cannot, however, charge families of SEND, vulnerable and FSM eligible children to attend. Sometimes people book up on things that are free and, when it comes to it, we decide not to turn up – it’s human nature. The problem with that in relation to Fit for All, is that if parents book a place for their child or young person it means someone else can’t have it; and if they don’t turn the place goes to waste. So, you can charge people for their children not attending – but you should be able to show this doesn’t put them off from booking.
Fit for All sessions don’t all have to last the same. Although the assumption made in HAF is that funded sessions are all 4hrs long, SEND providers have leeway to adapt the sessions to different durations. It may be the children you are working with need only 1.5 hour sessions. Many other SEND children benefit from 2 or 3 hour sessions. However long your session is, you will expected to build in meal and snack-time. Bear in mind the Government guidance on physical activity – 60 minutes a day for 5-18 year olds; but 20 minutes a day for disabled children.
Please share your ideas and thoughts about planning sessions with Paul or Laura at Children’s Quarter. Childrens Quarter is the organisation which coordinates Fit For All.
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