Inclusive spaces at OTR

B+B R+D has commissioned this article as part of our ‘test’ and ‘reflect’ inclusion action research. All of the articles in this series represent the views of the author and not of B+B R+D or our partner organisations.

Some of the articles describe experiences of discrimination that readers may find upsetting.

OTR is a charity and mental health social movement by and for young people aged 11-25 in Bristol, South Gloucestershire and North Somerset. Our aim is to work inclusively across the diverse communities in this region; a big claim, and living this in reality is as challenging as it is important to us. We seek to do this in a number of ways, underpinned by a clearly defined set of values, and through a diverse offer of projects, partnerships, and access points for young people. As you would expect, we often hit stumbling blocks with these ambitions, identify blind spots and have to reflect and learn from these experiences. We hope that it is this willingness to learn, remain teachable and not complacent, that will help to make our spaces and projects more inclusive and impactful in the long run.

Our ‘4Cs’ summarise the underpinning principles we try to embed in order to be as inclusive, engaging and participatory as possible. These are Choice, Consent, Confidentiality and Complaints. By using these as the starting points for designing our projects, engaging with young people, and evaluating and developing our work, we hope to have the best chance of making a real impact on the mental health and wellbeing of young people in our communities. Closely connected to this and key to our model, are our HUBs. These drop-in spaces are informed by a strong evidence base and are designed and implemented in a considered way. They are advocated for by Mind’s Fund the Hubs campaign and attempt to remove the barriers that many young people face in trying to access the right support for their mental health and wellbeing at the right time. HUBs are open access and don’t require sign-up, commitment, or referral by another professional or adult, all of which are known to reduce engagement and pose a barrier, particularly for young people from marginalised groups. Young people can attend alone, with a friend, family member, or trusted professional. They are facilitated by OTR’s Engagement Workers - who importantly, are not therapists - as well as young volunteers aged 18-25 (we call them ‘Peer Navigators’). This enables those who attend to talk to people with closer lived experience, and removes the perceived power dynamic that they may experience speaking to a professional. Primarily HUBs function as a space in which young people can find out more about our services (and other relevant available services), get a ‘taste’ of OTR and be supported to sign up to the project or support that they self-identify as the best fit for them. Almost all of our services are by self referral or sign up by the young person and are all free to access.

While HUBs are effective spaces in engaging young people with our work, we are also aware that geography, representation, cost of travel, or anxiety itself remain barriers to many young people who could potentially benefit from our support. HUBs take place at one of two central locations within the areas in which we operate. Alongside HUBs therefore, we also run ‘pop-ups’, which are mini, remote versions of a hub. They usually run in schools, colleges, universities, community centres and events, and anywhere else that young people are. The pop-up model goes a significant way to increasing our reach and inclusivity by literally meeting people ‘where they are at’. It also places us in environments alongside organisations, groups, or professionals, that are to an extent known and trusted in the community. Our involvement here is dependent on building partnerships and relationships which can also help in endorsing or translating our work effectively, as well as providing opportunities to collaborate, as seen with our work informed by social prescribing, in order to reach a targeted population with distinctive support needs. This is often young people experiencing care, young men, or people with disabilities.

While HUBs are effective spaces in engaging young people with our work, we are also aware that geography, representation, cost of travel, or anxiety itself remain barriers to many young people who could potentially benefit from our support.

Recent experience in pop-ups has prompted reflection on how we are as inclusive as possible in the diverse range of settings that we reach. During a pop-up in South Bristol, Engagement Workers had shown a short introductory video about OTR to start a conversation about wellbeing, strengths, and goals. Afterwards they felt that this pop-up hadn’t ‘landed’ well, or as intended, and young people hadn’t seemed to engage with our messaging. In this case, this disconnect was due to a disparity between OTR’s strengths-based, brightly branded approach and tone, in a setting where opportunity and connectivity felt unattainable and unlikely. This has since prompted lots of reflection and discussions within our Engagement Team on how we can remain authentic in our messaging, and have positive conversations about wellbeing, but adapt to the environment and experiences of the audience accordingly.

First of all, how do we ensure that messages about inclusivity and social justice aren’t in some ways marginalising themselves, and are able to cut across intersections? The key to this lies in talking about commonalities and intersections of everyday experiences which impact on communities and individuals mental health, rather than leaning into discussions around identity. Much of this depends heavily on asking open questions and listening before we lead with our own message, or overlay assumptions, particularly in communities that are furthest from our current or traditional reach. In this way we can be guided and informed by people who are experts in their own experiences, rather than presenting messaging which can feel alienating. This can be as simple as “how was your day/ week/ morning?” or “What was the last thing that made you feel sad/ anxious/ angry/ scared?” From here, we can explore support options, and co-create strategies using their tool box and their lived experience.

Following this experience we also met with colleagues from Project Zazi, who focus on engaging and providing support to young Black people and young people of colour. They bring extensive valuable insight into engaging with and supporting communities who are traditionally over-represented in terms of need, but under-represented in accessing services which are often not designed with them in mind. Three of the key learnings from these discussions were the importance of consistency/persistence, representation, and the need to engage the wider community.

In terms of persistence, their experience points to the fact that marginalised communities of all identities have often experienced similar interactions with services, projects and professionals. A pattern forms: gaps and needs are identified; funding pops up; projects are devised (often quickly and from ‘outside’); discernable impact is low or complex, and the service pulls out as funding is discontinued. This repeated experience leads to understandable distrust of services and professionals having meaningful commitment to working with a community, and significantly harms the prospect of future projects. Given the funding bias to ‘evidence based approaches’, this often means it is not possible to establish an evidence base for work in marginalised communities as the support lacks longevity. It therefore becomes really important to make the case for practitioners and projects to be given the time and resources to establish longer-term relationships in communities, to build trust, and ensure impact over time. Engagement and impact shouldn’t be expected on the first visit, but continuing to show up is all important. While projects can’t reasonably be expected to achieve this in every area or community they cover, this can be developed by partnership work with other more local, known and trusted services, another; approach effectively employed through our social prescribing ‘Community Partnerships’ team, as well as Project Zazi.

This repeated experience leads to understandable distrust of services and professionals having meaningful commitment to working with a community, and significantly harms the prospect of future projects.

Representation poses possibly a bigger barrier in communities such as South Bristol, which is one of the most deprived wards in the country. The mental health and charity sectors are not only overwhelmingly white and female, but possibly more inflexibly university educated, and middle class. Recruitment into the field most often requires degree level qualification or above, alongside years of experience which is often implicitly voluntary or unpaid. These are opportunities and luxuries that people from such communities are much less likely to have been able to access, meaning that our very workforce lacks the lived experience of those we hope to support. Finding ways to properly facilitate and compensate young volunteers from a wide range of backgrounds to work with us is one way to help move toward better representation, while critically examining our recruitment, interview, and selection processes to broaden our workforce as much as possible will also help.

The voice of the young person has always been central to OTR’s values and model. With a focus on our ‘by and for’ approach, the 4Cs, and our self-referral process, we centre the voice of the young person over and above that of parents, carers, family, and community, which is valid in so far as it recognises young people themselves as an often marginalised or silenced group, and the links between lack of voice, choice and agency, and poor mental health and wellbeing. However, in taking an implicitly individualistic view on ‘the young person’ in abstract from community and family, it is possible that this is a culturally and economically biassed approach. Particularly in marginalised communities, it may be more important to “win” or bring on board family and community, in order to establish trust and enable young people to be able to access our support. Some ways in which we have sought to do this is through attending parents' coffee mornings at schools and adapting our pop-up activities for delivery to parents and families. Further to this, in our Mental Health Support Team partnerships with CAMHS (the Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service), we are able to run workshops for parents and families, and collaborate with families to deliver interventions for young people themselves. Listening and promoting choice and agency for young people therefore needs to be balanced with bringing both family and community with us in order to facilitate engagement and access in many communities most in need of our provision.

Throughout this blog I have explored Hubs and pop-ups as two key inclusive spaces and approaches used by OTR to broaden our reach and engage a diverse and growing geographical area. While these models have many proven strengths in achieving this, taking note of blind spots and learning opportunities where things don’t ‘land’ has been a critical prompt for much needed reflection. Listening and speaking to everyday, common, and often intersectional experiences for young people from marginalised and underrepresented communities rather than over-laying our core beliefs and messages in ways that can themselves be alienating must be held in mind. We have to make sure this is reflected in conversations with funders, advocating for the resources to provide longevity and build trust. This is a delicate but important line to tread. We also must continue to find ways to broaden our workforce and become more representative, while ensuring that our centering of young people’s voice and choice is not at the expense of involving or engaging with family and the wider community.

Listening and speaking to everyday, common, and often intersectional experiences for young people from marginalised and underrepresented communities rather than over-laying our core beliefs and messages in ways that can themselves be alienating must be held in mind.

As an organisation that places mental health and wellbeing firmly within a social and political context, these may seem obvious approaches, but the challenge is to deliver our support in this way, in spite of a system often biassed towards short term and often individualised outcomes.