Research Discussion Paper September 2007 number 3 Volunteering with visually impaired people This publication summarises findings from A Review of Home Care and Support for People with Sight Loss, by Andrew Gibson, Dr Janet Read and Professor Gillian Lewando Hundt, Institute of Health, School of Health and Social Studies, University of Warwick. Part A of the review gives an overview of the current legislative and social policy environment relevant to home care and support. Part B looks at volunteer-based services designed to promote and maintain the independence of older people with visual impairments living in the community. This paper is concerned with the second part, which presents five detailed case studies of existing volunteer services aimed at people with sight loss. Methodology A range of agencies may use volunteers to provide support to people with a visual impairment: health, education and social services, independent care providers, voluntary sector organisations and small community groups. It was not possible to carry out a comprehensive search of all these areas in the time available for the review, so it was decided to use four main approaches to select relevant information: 1. Contacting organisations known to the authors in the health and social care field, particularly those concerned with visual impairment. These contacts yielded further contacts in turn. Thomas Pocklington Trust 1
2. Undertaking a web-based search of the sites of general volunteering organisations such as the National Council for Voluntary Organisations (NCVO); organisations specifically involved in providing services to people with sight loss, e.g. RNIB; and databases such as that of the Institute for Volunteering Research. 3. Analysing project reports and evaluations and in some cases making follow-up telephone calls. 4. Interviewing representatives of a cross-section of organisations that use volunteers to support people with a visual impairment. Models of volunteering Zimmeck 1 categorises different forms of volunteering in terms of their organisational context. This leads her to contrast what she terms the modern and home grown' models of organising and managing volunteers. The modern approach advocates extending to volunteers the rules and procedures already applied to employees. It therefore concentrates on controlling and regulating their relationships with their managers and with other paid co-workers. While recognising that volunteers may be motivated by different incentives from employees, it tends to focus on those that are most employeelike, such as payment of expenses and access to training. The home grown model is less structured and more tolerant of ambiguity than the modern model. It recognises the differences between volunteers and employees, including the different incentives that motivate each group. The emphasis is often on consistency in the application of values rather than in the application of rules and procedures. In the home grown model both employees and volunteers are often given more control over their work than in the modern model. It is important to recognise that one model is not necessarily superior to the other; each has its own strengths and weaknesses. It is perhaps best to think of these two models as existing at opposite ends of a continuum, with many voluntary-based organisations displaying elements of both approaches. The five case studies featured in the research exemplify this, as they show a range of organisational contexts right across the spectrum. 1 Zimmeck M (2001) The Right Stuff: new ways of thinking about managing volunteers. Institute for Volunteer Research, University of East London. 2 Thomas Pocklington Trust
Volunteering with visually impaired people: five case studies Sixty Plus Intergenerational Reading Scheme This scheme occupies a midpoint in the continuum between home grown and modern. It is a good example of the voluntary sector working in partnership with other organisations, in this case schools, and is of particular interest because it uses an intergenerational approach. Sixty Plus is a small charity based in Kensington and Chelsea which helps older people to maintain their independence. The charity offers a wide range of services including a quarterly newsletter, befriending service, shopping trips and help with gardening. The intergenerational work consists of three projects: a reading project, computer coaching, and a language-coaching project. The reading project was developed to fill a perceived gap in statutory service provision and is aimed specifically at people with visual impairments. Volunteers are recruited from local sixth forms to make weekly visits to older people with a visual impairment. Visits last for about an hour and take place throughout most of the school year. Volunteers help with tasks such as reading letters, newspapers or novels, sorting out mail and taking dictation. Funding The project is funded through the Task Force Trust, a charitable trust interested in promoting youth volunteering. Benefits This project provides a valuable service to visually impaired people and helps build community cohesion. It also contributes to the education of young people while providing a solution to the perennial problem of finding sufficient volunteers to maintain a service. However, the service is dependent on establishing and maintaining active links with local schools. Thomas Pocklington Trust 3
W EYES (Walsall Consumer Group for Blind and Partially Sighted People) W EYES has been going for approximately five years, and about 30 regulars attend its monthly meetings. The chair, secretary, treasurer and fund-raiser all have personal experience of living with the consequences of visual impairment. Besides the monthly meetings, which are usually addressed by an invited speaker, the group provides the following services, which are designed to fill the gaps left by statutory services: A regular newsletter A transcription service An equipment loan service providing items such as CCTV cameras, including portable ones, scanners (which can read text out loud), and Braille note takers. Funding The group has obtained funding from a number of sources but its main source has been Community Chest grants. Benefits W EYES is an example both of the home grown approach to developing a service and of collective advocacy, where groups of service users campaign on behalf of themselves or others to resolve issues that affect them collectively. However, not all local groups are fortunate enough to possess a core group of people with the relevant administrative and organisational skills to set up and run a group such as W EYES. This may have to be provided from outside. RNIB Outreach Peer Support Service Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea The aims of this one-year project were: to provide immediate support for people with newly acquired sight loss to provide volunteering opportunities for people with sight loss to help the supported individuals maintain confidence and self-esteem, and therefore increase independence to act as an immediate safety net covering the gap between the time a person develops a visual impairment and the time that Social Services becomes involved. 4 Thomas Pocklington Trust
How it works This project is an example of peer advocacy and support and is at the modern end of the continuum. There were three elements to the support provided: 1. Peer support volunteers whose role was to support other people with sight loss. 2. When appropriate, the provision of group support. 3. A telephone service that provided support until an appropriate peer support volunteer could be allocated to the caller. Group sessions lasted for about an hour and began with members introducing themselves and describing their own experiences and discussing the range of services which they found useful in the early stages of sight loss. One-to-one sessions took place once a week and lasted about an hour, though this was flexible. Funding The project was funded by Westminster Primary Care Trust. Benefits The benefits of this type of project are twofold. Service users receive ongoing support, either via a volunteer or via a group. This helps them maintain and develop their confidence and independence while limiting the danger that they will become socially excluded as a result of their visual impairment. From the volunteers perspective it provides an opportunity for people with sight loss to help someone else with a newly acquired visual impairment. Peer support can therefore potentially help both service users and volunteers. However, this type of service takes considerable planning and preparation to operate successfully. Thomas Pocklington Trust 5
RNIB Talk and Support An alternative approach to overcoming social isolation is a tele-befriending service providing group support over the phone. This is particularly useful for a group that is spread over a wide geographical area. Like the RNIB Outreach service in Case Study 3, this project incorporates elements of peer support, since all the group members have a visual impairment. It also leans toward the modern model of volunteer organisation and management. The purpose of the service is to improve the socialisation opportunities of those taking part, to alleviate the anxiety of being alone and/or with sight problems, and to enable visually impaired people to gain mutual support in order to create strategies for coping. The groups usually comprise between six and eight people, and each phone session lasts for about an hour. Participants are matched beforehand according to interests, age, locality, etc., and trained volunteers act as group facilitators. Funding The project is funded by a Big Lottery Fund grant and through a contribution of 2 per call from each service user. Benefits One of the advantages of this scheme is that the volunteer facilitators can work from home. This has greatly increased the number of people prepared to volunteer for the role. A further advantage is that both the recruitment interview and the training can also be done by phone. However, the cost of the equipment required to operate such a system may be prohibitive. 6 Thomas Pocklington Trust
Sunderland Age Concern Tele-support and Friendly Faces Visiting Service Whatever the advantages of a tele-befriending service, it cannot act as a substitute for face-to-face contact. This project combines home visiting with telephone support for people with a visual impairment, under the general umbrella of providing support to older people. Although associated with a large bureaucratically organised agency (Sunderland Social Services), it has a relatively informal approach to managing its volunteers. It is also dependent on local contacts to provide its service. It therefore leans towards the home grown model of volunteer organisation. It is a good example of a local organisation working in partnership with Social Services to provide low-level, preventative services. The telephone and home visiting services are both provided by Sunderland Age Concern and based at their offices. Referrals for both services come from a variety of sources including Social Services, local GPs and self-referrals. The two services share a pool of volunteers. All new referrals for the home visiting service are referred to the telephone service if a home visitor is unavailable. This ensures that people receive at least some support while on the waiting list for home support. The telephone service Every member of the scheme is phoned by a volunteer at least once a week at an agreed time. This may in some cases be a brief check call, but it may take longer, depending on the needs of the service user. If there is no reply to the call, and the service has not been informed that the person involved is away from home, the volunteer makes further checks to ensure the person is not in difficulty. There is no charge and no time limit on the telephone calls. The support provided by the telephone service is flexible and can include information about local services, advocacy, practical advice and social and emotional support. Volunteers also follow up any concerns expressed by the service user, e.g. chasing up Social Services referrals or requesting housing repairs. Members of the scheme can also telephone a volunteer if they need advice or support with a particular issue and cannot wait for their weekly call. Thomas Pocklington Trust 7
The home visiting service The home visiting service aims to visit people in their homes at least once a week for about an hour. In some cases, however, the volunteer visits twice or even three times a week. The support offered is flexible and can include a chat over a cup of tea, escorting to local shops or helping with practical tasks such as gardening. Funding The idea for the service originated with Sunderland Social Services, which has given Sunderland Age Concern funding since 2000 to provide it. Benefits This type of home visiting service can complement the type of nationally organised Tele Support services provided by the RNIB. Running a telephone support and home befriending scheme together also means that the two services can support each other by, for example, sharing volunteers or, where appropriate, referring people between the two services. As this example indicates, there could be advantages in partnerships between specialist sight loss organisations and organisations that provide generalist support to older people. This can reduce the burden of recruiting, training and supporting volunteers, and make it easier for people with a visual impairment to access other services provided by such an organisation, for example benefits advice. 8 Thomas Pocklington Trust
Observations These five case studies illustrate the wide spectrum of services that volunteers provide to visually impaired people. The services range from traditional volunteering roles such as assisting with household tasks, through peer support to collective advocacy. The studies also indicate that these types of services can be provided within a variety of organisational contexts, from large, bureaucratically organised agencies to relatively small organisations that have developed organically to meet local needs. The case studies also provide examples of partnership working in this area. The range of potential partnerships is wide, including health, social services, education and the independent sector. The findings from the report suggest that volunteer-based services, providing low level support, could make a significant contribution to promoting the independence and quality of life of people with a visual impairment living in the community. References Zimmeck M (2001) The Right Stuff: new ways of thinking about managing volunteers. Institute for Volunteer Research, University of East London. Rochester C (1999) One size does not fit all: four models of involving volunteers in small voluntary organisations. Voluntary Action 1, 2, Spring 1999, pages 7-20. For a full report of research findings, see Rochester C, Harris J, and Hutchison R (1999) Building the Capacity of Small Voluntary Agencies, vol 1, Final Report, and vol 2, Juggling on a Unicycle: A handbook for Small Voluntary Agencies, Centre for Voluntary Organisation, London School of Economics. Thomas Pocklington Trust 9
Author Andrew Gibson Research Fellow Institute of Health School of Health and Social Studies University of Warwick How to obtain further information For more detail on the research project discussed above, contact Thomas Pocklington Trust at: Thomas Pocklington Trust 5 Castle Row Horticultural Place London W4 4JQ Tel: 020 8995 0880 Email: info@pocklington-trust.org.uk Web: www. pocklington-trust.org.uk Copies of this report in large print, audio tape or CD, Braille and electronic format are available from Thomas Pocklington Trust. 10 Thomas Pocklington Trust
Background on Pocklington Thomas Pocklington Trust is the leading provider of housing, care and support services for people with sight loss in the UK. Each year we also commit around 600,000 to fund social and public health research and development projects. Pocklington s operations offer a range of sheltered and supported housing, residential care, respite care, day services, home care services, resource centres and community based support services. A Positive about Disability and an Investor in People organisation, we are adopting quality assurance systems for all our services to ensure we not only maintain our quality standards, but also seek continuous improvement in line with the changing needs and expectations of our current and future service users. We are working in partnership with local authorities, registered social landlords and other voluntary organisations to expand our range of services. Our research and development programme aims to identify practical ways to improve the lives of people with sight loss, by improving social inclusion, independence and quality of life, improving and developing service outcomes as well as focusing on public health issues. We are also applying our research findings by way of pilot service developments to test new service models and develop best practice. In this publication, the terms visually impaired people, blind and partially sighted people and people with sight loss all refer to people who are blind or who have partial sight. Thomas Pocklington Trust 11
5 Castle Row Horticultural Place Chiswick London W4 4JQ Tel: 020 8995 0880 Email: info@pocklington-trust.org.uk Web: www.pocklington-trust.org.uk Published by Thomas Pocklington Trust Registered Charity No. 1113729 Company Registered No. 5359336 ISBN 978-0-9554465-6-6 9 780955 446566