A new approach to family support: learning from The Sunshine Project
Photo by Richard Sagredo on Unsplash
What happens when family support is driven by a family’s own idea of “a good life” instead of just fixing problems?
Too often, existing systems don’t help families change their situation.
Family life is hard. When a parent or carer looks outside themselves for support, they are met with a system that is convoluted, under-resourced and difficult to navigate, especially for someone already under stress.
They might have to seek out multiple separate services, re-telling their story multiple times and dealing with the additional mental and practical load of engaging with different agencies.
For a number of families this does not lead to them improving their lives. They repeatedly call upon the same services, and their difficulties can snowball and end up causing them and their families greater harm. They may end up needing more costly and intensive support in the longer term.
The 100 Families WA Report (2021) identified a “mismatch between what families in entrenched disadvantage wanted and needed and what was currently on offer.” Anglicare WA and Ruah Community Services saw clearly the failings of the current system and decided to explore how to approach this differently. They collaborated to fund and conduct their own action research project, and asked ThirdStory (formerly Innovation Unit Australia New Zealand) to evaluate it.
The Sunshine Project supported families to work towards “a good life”
The Sunshine Project began in 2022, involving six families (27 individuals in total, including 18 children) in South Metropolitan Perth’s Kwinana-Rockingham region. The project approach was inspired by Hilary Cottam’s concept of “Radical Help” (2018) and the Liberated Method, a public service innovation developed in Northumbria, UK. It recognised the power of freeing up peoples’ own internal capacity for change: families identified and worked towards “a good life” for themselves.
The key elements of the approach include:
A Family Coach, a generalist worker who develops a relationship with a family over time, working with them day-to-day when and where that family needs it.
A flexible brokerage fund that can help address immediate needs (like paying for car insurance and rego following a minor accident)
Goal setting around families’ own vision of ‘the good life’ with gamified ‘quests’ and prizes along the way to celebrate success.
The Sunshine Project led by Anglicare WA and Ruah
Putting families in control - with the support of a Family Coach - made the difference.
The evaluation investigated both the impacts on the families involved and how these flowed through to the service system, to support the scaling or implementation of this approach in other contexts. Our data collection involved:
Reviewing the extensive documentation gathered by Anglicare WA and Ruah throughout the project
Interviewing families, representatives of collaborative organisations, representatives of government, and key members of the project delivery team using creative and innovative methods to understand and elicit different points of view.
The findings revealed a range of concrete outcomes for families including avoiding evictions, starting employment, accessing mental health supports or primary healthcare, children re-engaging with school, sports and social activities. Family members self-reported positive changes: In one survey, 100 per cent of respondents agreed that ‘things have gotten better in the last year’ and ‘I feel more hopeful about my family’s future than I did a year ago’. The development of greater self-efficacy and confidence is an important gain: one family member reported going from feeling ‘never in control’ of their life to feeling ‘in control’.
A cost-benefit analysis identified system savings from increased employment of participants, and decreased child protection and homelessness system involvement. It quantified the number of families (adults and children) affected, and modelled high, medium and low-cost/benefit scenarios. These helped support the project to gain ongoing funding and continue.
The evaluation also documented the contributing factors that led to these outcomes, namely:
The single trusted relationship with the Family Coach, who provides a combination of services and “gets things done”, within a broad and flexible scope of work
Families being in charge and taken seriously
Capacity building leading to changes in people’s intrinsic self-worth
These insights helped improve the program to increase impact in the future.
The findings also point to possible intergenerational impacts: while not evaluated, it is likely that the greatest benefits will be seen for children, in the lives that lie ahead of them.
Project team
Jay Martin Director, Development
Zoe O’Neill Senior Project Lead
Claire Dodd Senior Project Lead