Analytical Volunteer Programme (AVP)

1. Analytical Volunteer Programme (AVP) Dani Evans and Danielle Cornish

2. What will we cover… • What is AVP? • Dani’s experience volunteering at Techniquest • Danielle’s experience volunteering at Peninsula Trust • Important dates • How to apply • Questions

3. About the scheme What is it? How long for? • Short placements • Providing analytical support to voluntary sector organisations • Up to 5 days • Completed in one block or spread out • Arranged to fit around business needs Where? Who can take part? • London, • Wales & South West • The North • Analysts • All professions • All grades

4. Benefits to the Volunteer Project management, consultancy, time management and stakeholder engagement Valuable development opportunities Data presentation/dissemination and communicating with non-analysts Confidence, self-esteem and decision making abilities Gain experience of applying analysis skills to “real” problems Contribute towards 5 days of learning and development Learn about voluntary sector organisations Offers a real sense of achievement Volunteer in a professional capacity Experience a new working environment Opportunity to demonstrate a wide range of skills Take on a challenge Help meet corporate objectives

5. Benefits to the Department Promoting government professions and skills of staff Offers an alternative to formal training courses Offers development opportunities not available within departments, e.g. junior staff leading projects Greater satisfaction amongst employees Contributes towards departments corporate social responsibility policies Improves reputation of the department Build stronger links between the Civil Service and the voluntary sector Numerous areas of development for staff- mostly transferrable skills

6. Benefits to the Voluntary Organisation Offering skills that a voluntary organization is often lacking A FREE resource Provides opportunity to carry out projects that may never get started without the volunteer time Allows organisations to set up and improve systems and processes Allows for coaching and teaching of transferring skills allowing organisations to replicate analysis Enables organisations to use data to measure and improve their impact, target their work, apply for grants and streamline their activities

7. Voluntary organisations have benefitted from over 1000 volunteer hours so far Voluntary organisations that have so far taken place

8. Our aims and objectives for this year • Build on the success of 2014 and 2015 schemes • Trial expansion to other professions - offer more skill sets and encourage more volunteers • To get volunteers from ALL: • Government Departments • Grades • Increase: • Number of organisations we collaborate with • Engagement outside of London • Total number of volunteer hours

9. My volunteering experience…Data manipulation and analysis of Techniquest booking database data Dani Evans

10. The Organisation Engage people with science Motivate them to learn more Interactive experiences A range of services to schools and teachers Work extensively with public audiences World-wide reputation for creating programmes and exhibits Enjoyed by over 4 million people since its inception in Cardiff in 1986

11. What factors influence how schools engage with TQ? The project What factors influence the likelihood of a school engaging with us? Do outreach promotions/offers have a negative impact upon the number of school visitors that we receive? How does outreach activity impact upon levels of inreach? Membership scheme Time of year vs programme Categories of customer’s

12. The Process • 1 hour initial meeting at TQ to discuss project • 5 days – 1 day a week for 5 weeks • A report: • Overview of data manipulation and analysis • Issues with data and suggestions • Suggestions for future analysis • Recommendations

13. Data manipulation • Cleaning the data • Unique school IDs • Postcodes • Create time of year variables • Booking date and event date • Year, academic year, month, period (i.e. 201401) and term (1, 2, 3, August). • Lead time between booking and visit in months • Linking data to external data sources • Deprivation decile • Distance to travel to TQ, and time taken to travel. • Engagement variable • Number of visits • Proxy - number of children - categorised into groups of 20

14. Data analysis - When do schools engagement with TQ?

15. Data analysis - When do schools engagement with TQ?

16. Data analysis - When do schools engagement with TQ?

17. Data analysis - When do schools engagement with TQ?

18. Data analysis - Analysis by group sizes

19. Data analysis - Travelling time

20. Data analysis - Percentage of engagement that is inreach by the travel time in minutes

21. Data analysis - Deprivation groups

22. Data analysis - Deprivation groups

23. Issues and Suggestions • Issues and suggestions • Unclean data • Unique identifiers • Themes • Add in validation rules • Suggestions for future analysis • Cross tabulations • Regression Modelling • Other external datasets

24. Successes for the volunteer • Volunteering is satisfying - especially using my professional skills • A new working environment, and how other organisations operate • Increase confidence, self-esteem and decision making abilities • Developed project management, time management and stakeholder engagement abilities • Practice communicating results to non-analysts

25. My Volunteering Experience… Deprivation in the Rame Peninsula Danielle Cornish

26. The Organisation

27. The Organisation • ~5000 residents • ~500 members • Ageing population • Isolated rural area • Reliant on investment & grant aid • Activities: • Community support projects • Community investment projects

28. The Project • To build reliable, detailed information about the economic, demographic and social situation of the area • Reduce reliance on case studies • Specific detail below local authority level • Data in a form suitable for: • Presentations to authorities • Information briefings to the community • Grant/finance applications

29. The Process • One meeting with the organisation in person • Three days remote working from ONS • A lot of Googling • A report containing data from: • Population Estimates (ONS) • Census 2011 (ONS) • English Indices of Multiple Deprivation (DCLG) • Claimant counts (DWP) • Business turnover & profit (DueDil)

30. The Results Proportions of Rame versus UK residents in different age groups. Source: Annual Mid-Year Population Estimates for the UK, ONS.

31. The Results Proportion of households without central heating in different areas of England. . Source: 2011 Census: Aggregate data, ONS

32. The Results Barriers to Housing & Services Living Environment Source: Indices of Multiple Deprivation 2015, DCLG. http://dclgapps.communities.gov.uk/imd/idmap.html

33. The Results Proportion of residents in different areas of England who receive a state pension. Source: Department for Work and Pensions, Claimants Counts, May 2015.

34. The Results Mean gross profit of businesses in different areas of the UK. Source: DueDil.

35. Recommendations • Advised on further data sources that are not freely available, such as: • Labour Force Survey • Community Lifestyle Survey • Annual Business Survey • Provided methodological detail to allow future follow-up work where necessary

36. Successes for the Organisation We have used the report several times already, most recently to support a large grant application to build work units - if we get that one, our long-term future is secure through the rental income, safeguarding our community support and welfare work indefinitely. We are a small community Trust with very limited resources. We could not afford to get high-quality work of this kind. The simple fact of having a focused, high-quality report makes us more worth listening to.

37. Successes for the Volunteer • Dissemination experience • Project planning & management experience • User insight • Interesting subject that I wouldn’t have otherwise encountered • Lessons Learned to take back to my team

38. Difficulties • Defining the project clearly • Tight timescales • Finding low-level data

39. How to get involved • We will be getting organisations on board throughout October • Formal applications for volunteers will launch on the 31st October at: • https://gss.civilservice.gov.uk/careers/analytical-volunteer-program-avp/ • In the meantime, register your interest!

40. Further Information Any general queries can be directed to the AVP inbox: AnalyticalVolunteer@gmail.com Regional Contacts: London: South West & Wales: Manchester & The North: Laura Fisher Laura.Fisher115@mod.uk Simone Walters Simone.Walters@hmrc.gov.uk William Rose William.Rose@justice.gov.uk Dani Evans Dani.Evans014@Wales.gov.uk Danielle Cornish Danielle.Cornish@ons.gov.uk Anna Nikiel Anna.Nikiel@hmrc.gov.uk

41. Any Questions?