Projects

Duke of Edinburgh Disadvantaged Youth Program evaluation

Client.
The Duke of Edinburgh’s International Award Office Australia
Services
Review, Engagement

Assessing the impact of a national leadership program to assist vulnerable young people to engage with their school and community.

01.
Client issue

The Duke of Edinburgh’s International Award—Australia is a structured youth development program for young people between 14 and 24 years old. Its delivery model, distributed through local licensed Award Centres across Australia gives it significant reach and recognition. The Disadvantaged Youth Program received significant funding from the Australian Government to increase participation in the Award from young people experiencing disadvantage.

The National Office engaged us to evaluate the program success on two occasions (2018 and 2021), to provide to their funders and to continue to improve program design and delivery.

02.
Our approach

Our team designed and conducted a comprehensive evaluation including:

  • Developing a change model, drawing on program logic and realist evaluation techniques
  • Researching the efficacy of the Award internationally for this cohort through a comprehensive literature review
  • Data analysis to develop insights on locations, cohorts and trends by accessing breadth of participant experience through a national survey of participants
  • Recruitment of ‘keystone’ Award Centres for more detailed site-specific work including case studies, teacher/Award Leader interviews and surveys to explore impact on school engagement), interviews with volunteers and focus groups with young people.

The sites explored included urban and regional sites in the Northern Territory, Victoria, NSW, South Australia and Queensland and captured different participant types (eg low SES, young people living with disability, young people who were disengaged from school or community) and implementation approaches (integrated with school curriculum, operated separately).

03.
Result

  • We found that the Program made it possible for disadvantaged young people to participate in the Award, giving them access to different life experiences. For many young people, they told us this experience was life changing
  • The structure of the program supported flexibility, creating the conditions for young people to engage (or re-engage) more fully with community, education and volunteering opportunities
  • We also found that there was strong circumstantial evidence that participation was a protective factor through the Covid-19 period.

04.
Key learnings

  • There was already an existing international research base suggesting that the Duke of Ed could be profound for vulnerable young people. Our evaluations built on these to assist in understanding the most effective change elements
  • Using different methods—interviews with key players, de-identified questionnaires about individuals pre- and post-participation, and talking to participants themselves—built a rich and rounded perspective of what does and doesn’t work
  • Young people of all walks of life really valued the opportunity to be part of a mainstream program, rather than having to be streamed in different ways. For young people with disability, participation offered them the opportunity to challenge and enrich themselves in ways that were otherwise not possible.

“I’m so glad we used The Insight Partnership. You really understood what we were looking for. Because of you, we successfully bid for more funding for this important program.”

National Program Manager