Additional funding announced for project exploring children's outcomes in Scotland

We are pleased to announce new funding for an ADR Scotland research programme on Understanding Children’s Lives and Outcomes.

With a grant of £319,212 from the ADR UK Strategic Hub Fund, this funding enables the Scottish Centre for Administrative Data Research (SCADR) to build on existing work and expand their research in this crucial area. This will enable a better understanding of the pathways and outcomes of children and young people in Scotland and help to improve their health, wellbeing and attainment.

Led by Fiona Mitchell and Professor Morag Treanor, who both have extensive experience and links with policy and practitioner networks focused on children and young people, this research will focus on two core areas of research:

• Exploring context, factors and approaches to educational exclusions and absence
• Growing up in kinship care – increasing knowledge of the needs, circumstances and outcomes of children in formal kinship care.

This work is funded from October 2020 - March 2022 and will utilise datasets brought together for the first time by Scottish Government. Working closely with policy colleagues, the ADR Scotland public panel and a new advisory group, this research programme aims to:

• Inform policy and practice, in line with key developments including the implementation of The Promise following the Independent Care Review and initiatives such as the Scottish Attainment challenge
• Maximise synergies and collaboration with UK research in this area
• Promote the use and re-use of this data for the future.

Co-lead of SCADR's Children’s programme, Professor Treanor, said: “Linking datasets provides new ways to analyse children’s outcomes and provide evidence-based insights for key policy debates. We aim not only to look at children in isolation but situate them within their household and familial context.”

You can find out more about the Understanding Children's Lives and Outcomes project on the project page.