recovery through discovery developing partners

Our History  Research Governance Framework (2002) – highlighted the need for service user and carer involvement in ALL aspects of the research process  DEVELOP - Service User and Carer Group who helped us devise our skills development programme  ARISE - Accessible Research Involvement for Service Evaluation, was our first project. It gave us the experience we needed to set up developing partners. I suppose you could say we have ARISEN!

recovery through discovery  What we are:  DoH Funded Social Enterprise  Company Ltd by Guarantee  Workers Co-operative  Employment for All  The greatest barrier people face is not being given the chance to prove their effectiveness”, (DoH, 2006)‏  Undertake research and evaluation and staff training relevant to our own lived experience  Most important aspect is enabling the voices of those least often heard to be listened to!

Our Philosophy  Paulo Freire  Brazilian Educational Psychologist  Conceptual Framework  Knowledge is not neutral – there are hidden agendas contained within it.  Oppressed peoples often experience life as objects – they are acted upon, as opposed to acting for themselves.  They can sometimes lack the critical skills essential for influencing the institutions that have control over their lives.  He advocated for a process he called “Conscientization”

Conscientization  Changes in both the internal and external world of the person  Development of the link between knowledge and power through self directed action  Allows people to question the nature of their historical and social situation  Transforms the object experience of being acted upon into a subject experience of acting upon

Our Philosophy  Ignacio Martin-Baro  Jesuit Priest and Liberation Psychologist  “If our aim is to serve the liberation needs of the people, we need to ally ourselves with poor and oppressed groups in their struggle for justice and dignity.”  “We need to develop a progressive psychology that helps people find the road to their personal and collective historical fulfilment In our case more than anyone else’s, the principal holds…the concern of the social scientist should be not so much to explain the world, as to change it.”

What Does That Look Like?  Power Awareness: making and remaking society and history by human action  Critical Analysis of Discourse: beyond the surface impressions to an in depth analysis  De-socialisation: Challenging the myths, values and behaviours adopted as object  Self Organisation and Education:Transformational relationships based on equality and shared power

Problem Posing  Experiential: Learn by doing  Participatory: At a level that suits the individual  Situated: In the lived experience of the individual  Democratic: Mutually constructed by the individual and the group  Dialogic: raises awareness and facilitates the process of conscientization / awareness  Challenges oppression: active subjects not passive objects  Activist: seeks answers through the research process

Personal / Professional Programme  Tees Region Open College Network  Four modules: Research and Development  Personal / Professional Development  Counselling Skills  Free Module: Domestic Violence, Gender Issues, Human Rights, negotiable choice

Research Governance  Criminal Records Bureau Checks  Honorary Contracts  Peer Review Group  Awareness of roles and responsibilities  Confidentiality  Health and Safety: Mandatory Training  Occupational Health Checks

recovery through discovery  Work we are currently involved in doing or developing:  British Institute for Human Rights – Service User Charter  Legal Services Commission – Sectioning Process  Employment for people with MH needs – Government Office North East  Young People who self harm - HTA, DoH  Mental Health First Aid - CSIP / NIMHE  Access to Psychological Therapies - North Tees and Hartlepool PCT / NIMHE / CSIP  Access to Primary Care Services for prisoners - PORSCH Network, Public Health Observatory  Service User and Survivor Trainers Network - SUSTN National

dp Evaluation  How we are going to evaluate our own project!  Liberation and Community Psychology  Participatory Action Research  Service User led outcome measures  Concrete measures - housing, care package, education, time feeling well  Broad range of tools - diaries, narrative accounts, focus groups, observational  Professor Raquel Guzzo - Brazil

recovery through discovery  A Word about the Recovery Process  Can occur without professional intervention  Essential to have people who believe in and support you in the process of recovery  Is not linked to the cause of the problem  Can take place even if symptoms re-occur  Alters the pattern and symptoms of the illness  Does not happen in a straight line  Consequences of mental ill health more difficult to recover from than the original episode  Does not mean the illness never happened!