Tobacco & Inequalities Project (phase 2)

Aims

The Tobacco and Inequalities Project ran between October 1999 and September 2002. Funded by the Scottish Executive and HEBS (now part of NHS Health Scotland), the project aimed to build on the recommendations of the Women, Low Income and Smoking Project. The aims of the new project were as follows:

• To support the development of community based services which would enable the reduction of smoking among those living on low income;
• To develop evaluation approaches relevant to those working at community level undertaking smoking based work; and
• To support national, regional and local initiatives developed in response to the White Paper on Tobacco, Smoking Kills and the White Paper on Public Health, Towards a Healthier Scotland 1999 (no longer available online).

In support of these aims, the focus of the Tobacco and Inequalities Project has been on:

• Developing sustainable work in communities where inequalities in health are evident; and
• Promoting the involvement of a wide range of groups and organisations in work to develop smoking support services which target those communities where tobacco use is most prevalent and is still accepted as the norm.

As with the Women, Low Income and Smoking Project, this new work promoted a community development approach to tobacco work, acknowledging implicitly that local services must be responsive to the needs and life circumstances of the communities and individuals involved. As a result of this approach, the programmes developed may not tackle tobacco use explicitly in their early stages, and cessation is likely to be addressed as part of a wider agenda encompassing other health and lifestyle issues.

An evaluation report of the project is available. The report aims to:

• Describe the activities of the six initiatives, to present the process and findings of the evaluation of their work, and to enable dissemination of the resulting conclusions at local and national level.
• Describe how The Evaluation Journey: An Evaluation Resource Pack for Community Groups was piloted by the initiatives, and its subsequent development and dissemination.
• Provide information that will assist practitioners interested in developing, funding and evaluating community based tobacco work.

In addition to the Tobacco and inequalities evaluation report, three briefing papers are available which focus on the following aspects of the project's work:

• Tobacco work in the community
• Managing small grant work
• Evaluating community development work

The purpose of this series of briefing papers is to provide further information on specific aspects of the project that will assist practitioners and policy-makers interested in developing, funding and evaluating community based tobacco work.

The Evaluation Journey: An Evaluation Resource for Community Groups

A major theme to come out of ASH Scotland's Women, Low Income and Smoking Project was the need for informative and accessible resource materials on recording and evaluating community based work. This generic resource uses examples from topic-specific work to help groups and organisations through the process of monitoring and evaluating. The resource has been through a long development process which involved pre-testing, a peer review, a year-long pilot exercise with the ASH Scotland Tobacco and Inequalities initiatives and latterly a national consultation exercise. Prior to publication the resource was edited by the Plain English Campaign. It was published as a printed resource in Spring 2002.

Initially produced in A5 ring binder format, The Evaluation Journey is designed using images of travel to acknowledge that not all 'evaluation journeys' run smoothly. There are pitfalls and challenges along the way, and it may be necessary to change direction. The resource aims to:

• make evaluation accessible and easy to understand, especially for those with little previous experience
• show how evaluation can be embedded in ongoing work, and can inform the planning and development of future work
• offer guidance on collecting and analysing information using conventional and less conventional (for example, video diaries, collage work) ways of capturing and presenting information
• provide information on sources of support and advice on evaluation and research methods

The resource can be downloaded as four pdf files below. There is also an evaluation form, and we would be grateful if you would take the time to fill this in and return it when you have used the resource.

• Cover (PDF, 389 KB)
• Contents (PDF, 42 KB)
• Dividers (PDF, 1.59 MB)
• Text (PDF, 296 KB)
• Evaluation questionaire (PDF, 24 KB)

You will need Adobe Acrobat Reader to view the pdf's, you can download this at http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/readstep.html

For further information about the resource or to order a printed copy, please contact Jennifer Black at ASH Scotland.

Go to 'Previous Work' page

Click on the 'Inequalities' link in the left hand menu to go the Inequalities section. 

Last updated: 23 July 2009