Overview
2016-2019
The IQ Project supported a new vision for young people’s mental health and wellbeing - one in which accessible, self-referral Youth Information, Advice and Counselling Services (YIACS) are a key part of every local offer.
Through the IQ Project, Youth Access sought to improve young people’s access to high-quality, nationally-recognised models of integrated provision. We aimed to:
- Strengthen the coherence and profile of the existing Youth Access national network of YIACS
- Increase the integration of the YIACS model in local systems for young people’s mental health and wellbeing
- Improve the joint planning and commissioning of YIACS to meet young people’s mental health and wider wellbeing needs
Impact
The IQ Project, funded by the Department of Health, helped Youth Access fulfil its ambition of the Coalition Government’s Taskforce on children and young people’s mental health and wellbeing proposing YIACS as a key part of every local offer in their report ‘Future in Mind’.
Furthermore, through consultation with providers, young people, commissioners and other stakeholders, Youth Access developed tools and resources to enable:
- Service providers to have a national benchmark for the YIACS model; enabling them to plan and manage their services to meet agreed minimum requirements, and a tool in negotiations with funders and commissioners
- Young people to have better information about what they should expect as a minimum from a YIACS
- Local policy makers and commissioners to have guidance to (i) support the development of a local mental health offer and (ii) plan and fund services informed by a national service specification
A series of useful resources and best practice guides were developed as part of the project. These are available for you to access in the downloads below.