Noise Solution Impact Report 2022

OUR IMPACT June 2022

We see people, not problems

Impact headlines Halved low levels of wellbeing of the last 240 young people completing our course.

Wellbeing levels benchmarked against 30,000 responses to the same NHS wellbeing scale.

Delivered 2948 hours of music mentoring (1:1) over the last year, with over 150 young people in challenging circumstances.

Awards Winner

Of those completing 10 sessions, 75% started below the national average wellbeing level pre Noise Solution. After Noise Solution 84% Finished above, at or within 2 points of the national wellbeing average.

Wellbeing impacts for young women are nearly twice as high as for young men, with young women being the demographic often measured as having the lowest levels of wellbeing.

Our changes in wellbeing are independently evidenced to be saving over a million pounds a year in costs for families and services in the east of England (report available here).

Arts Council Digital trailblazer

We’ve demonstrated yet again, for the 6th year in a row, that improved wellbeing as an outcome is a statistical probability with us.

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All of which contributed this year to us being the winner of multiple national awards and nalists in multiple others.

Foreword from Simon Glenister #NeverMoreNeeded “Never more needed” is a term I’m hearing more and more. As a slogan, it recognises the agility and e ectiveness of charitable and social enterprise organisations like Noise Solution. Over the last two years, we’ve epitomised that agility and e ectiveness. Our record over lockdown and multiple national awards have underlined that we are both at the cutting edge of digital youth work and the digital impact capture and analysis of that work.

NHS Digital recently released data on young people’s mental health. It shows that in 2017, one in nine young people were presenting to NHS with diagnosable mental health conditions. That same survey was conducted after the rst lockdown, and the results show that the ratio of those presenting with diagnosable conditions is now signi cantly higher at one in six. The outlook is bleak. Mental health services are beyond strained.

Nationally, schools are struggling to locate an estimated 100,000 young people missing from education post lockdown and with the best will in the world, not all young people engage with or respond well to talking therapies. That’s if they even meet the incredibly high threshold for access.

We work in a way that doesn’t problematise, and ‘medicalise’ young people.

We see people, not problems. We’re creating positive change by not focusing on what’s wrong in a young person’s life but by creating the conditions in which we know they are more likely to thrive! Again and again, our programmes create the conditions that enable young people to choose to ourish. Rea irming that we are indeed #NeverMoreNeeded, something that is underlined by both data and story after story throughout this document.

Simon Glenister MEd, CEO

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We believe in a better way to support individuals that need it most, improving their lives and encouraging positive change.

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CONTENTS

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Impact headlines

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Foreword

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Who we are

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Theory of Change

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Applying what works

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What the platform achieves

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Sophie’s story

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Oscar’s story

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Kie’s story

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Outputs: Who we’re working with

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Outcomes: Measuring what matters

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Family and Carers’ voice

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Professionals’ voice

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Musicians’ Voice

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The future

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Socials

Who we are Whilst we present as a music organisation our focus is improving wellbeing. We have invested a signi cant amount of time and resources into researching what works when combining face to face and digital approaches and putting that research into practice.

We are a social enterprise developing new approaches to digital youth work. Approaches that create the conditions evidenced to enable people to thrive.

We enhance our work with a digital platform where individuals can transform the way they see themselves and the way the world sees them.

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“If one of our incredibly vulnerable children is not engaging with education, or needs support through a difficult time (often other tutor companies would not consider working with), then Noise Solution is the first port of call.” Virtual School professional “Noise Solution very clearly supported this young person through an incredibly difficult time and it was the only time in which the young person came out of their room over a period of two weeks, to get into the recording studio and engage with professionals through their online platform. Pretty much miraculous in such a short space of time.” Virtual School professional

Theory of change - SDT We are invested in creating the conditions in which positive wellbeing can ourish. We use Self Determination Theory (Deci & Ryan, 2001) to understand how to do that.

Autonomy

SDT evidences that to improve motivation and wellbeing we need to facilitate three psychological needs:

SDT has been empirically reviewed by multiple academic teams from around the globe, and has over 350,000 Google Scholar citations to date.

Autonomy - a sense of volitional control Competence - feeling good at something Relatedness - feeling connected to and seen by others All of our programmes are designed to support these three psychological needs. By doing so, the evidence tells us that as a result we get better health, social, education and engagement outcomes.

Relatedness

Competence

SDT is the lens we use across the whole organisation, to determine how we design all of our interactions with people (both face to face and digitally) who engage with us including the participant, those adults around the participant and our own sta .

“He became a more evolved, grown up young man. It gave him a safe area to grow, the music being the channel for personal growth. A reassuring oasis after having had several hard years at conventional schooling that really had left him feeling so insecure.” Parent fl

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We pair a participant with a professional music producer.

Applying what we know works

Over 20 hours (either inperson or online), we provide Musician an encouraging, fun environment to learn new Participant skills and create the music the participant wants to listen to, whatever the genre.

By using music technology to make the participant good at something quickly (competence) we can put them in control of their music making process (autonomy) and share their successes with people important to them (relatedness). These are evidenced psychological needs vital for wellbeing to ourish.

Relationship Building

Autonomy

Participants safely share session highlights and weekly video re ections of their thoughts and feelings about the session to their MyStream feed (a private and secure online space) and invite friends/key-workers and family to leave their feedback.

Participant

Relatedness Key-workers

MyStream

Carer/family

Without NS, the student would have become further disengaged from learning and ultimately society, as he felt undervalued and did not see himself a s a learner or someone who could be taught by teachers. A phenomenal way to engage students in learning.

Disengaged become engaged. (Professional’s feedback)

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Competence

This creates a supportive digital community around the participant which celebrates their success and, in doing so, increases protective factors.

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20 hours: Home and studio sessions

We’re not just enabling people to capture and share their stories on our platform…

We create digital communities around participants that celebrate success. It’s designed in a way that draws on wellbeing research to have positive impact. The platform enables easy collection and analysis of both case studies and NHS wellbeing scale data so we can visualise wellbeing changes.

The platform also automates the collecting of exit videos from family and key-workers (automatically transcribed) and soon to be automatically analysed.

We are starting to be able to sentiment and linguistically analyse audio data from within individuals ‘MyStream’ to look for indicators of wellbeing frustration or satisfaction. All this, plus referral data (also all in the same space), enables us to see in real time our impact on wellbeing.

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This really only scratches the surface of what we’re doing with the platform. All our information is accessible, easily analysable and in one single digital cloud based ‘bucket of truth’ meaning we can easily report on it.

Automated sentiment and linguistic analysis of re ection videos within participant’s ‘MyStream’

Case studies created by every participant - where rich video re ection is collected as part of every session

Exit feedback videos collected automatically from family and professionals and automatically transcribed and analysed

Universal bucket of ‘data’ truth

Population wellbeing data automatically analysed for range of change, statistical signi cance and benchmarked against national averages

Sophie

Just a few months ago, Sophie, from Ipswich, had been in hospital with various mental health issues, and traditiona therapies had not made an impact. But she says her life has been ‘saved’ since being referred to Noise Solution Sophie said: “The Noise Solution sessions were amazing, and I will remember it for the rest of my life,” said Sophie. “It really has saved my life. It’s not therapy, and that’s why it worked for me. It is about human connection, and music – some sessions we just talked, others we were jamming away to Red Hot Chilli Peppers……It’s helped me to be more con dent and to realise my potential. I’m grateful that I’ve had the opportunity to experience it, and I’d like to help raise awareness of it because I want other people to be able to try it as well.

Sophie was paired with Ipswich musician Jay, former bass player of Suffolk band Rosalita. She has always loved singing, song writing and piano, and has now had the chance to explore drums, bass guitar and 12-string guitar – as well as learning about the technical side of producing music Sophie said: “My tutor Jay has been great – I say tutor, but the sessions are very informal, which is the reason I like it so much…….What I like is that the sessions aren’t always about me.

It’s not that traditional power dynamic that you get in therapy, it’s more human.” she said Mum Patricia said: “Sophie has learnt about music in a fun way, and we’re so incredibly grateful to have had this opportunity. It was by chance that we found out about Noise Solution, and it turned out to the perfect t “Sophie shares what she does on the online platform, and we can see what they do in the sessions - she is just laughing all the time! It It has been wonderful.

#MentalHealth .

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Photo credit: Rue Hackett .

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Read more impact stories here .

Nineteen-year-old Sophie said her experience of Noise Solution was ‘simply amazing’. She has gone from often struggling to leave home, to preparing to play a live gig...and credits Noise Solution and her tutor, local musician Jay, for helping her to ful l her potential

Oscar

The power of music has helped to transform the life of a Derby musician – who now wants to raise awareness of the award-winning programme. Oscar, 22, said his experience of Noise Solution has changed his life and led to him thriving in the music scene and nding his purpose.

Oscar said he struggled while growing up – acting out at school and not attending classes. He now knows this was down to not having been diagnosed with autism, but at the time he couldn’t understand why he found life so challenging. As a teenager, this led to him moving out of his family home, and into a hostel “I tried to go to college to study music, but it didn’t work,” he said. “I was depressed and struggling, I did the occasional gig but I was feeling low and had put on weight…it was a really dif cult time for me.” He was referred to Noise Solution after hearing about it at college, and worked with musician Simon Glenister, who is also its founder and CEO. “Simon taught me how to make music using a computer,” said Oscar. “I created some music that I was really proud of, and Simon was really knowledgeable and nurturing during the sessions, so I started to feel more con dent. The studio was really cool and I was enjoying the sessions. I went from playing bass guitar to writing my own music, which was a great feeling.

Oscar went back to college and successfully applied to university – and has recently graduated with a rst class degree from the University of Derby. He has a popular alternative music blog called ‘Needs More Cowbell’ and continues to work on his own tracks “It’s thanks to my work with Simon at Noise Solution that I ever even attempted to pursue a career in music,” he said “Simon taught me the building blocks of writing music and lyrics, and gave me the opportunity to work in a professional music studio. I quickly fell in love with the process and many years later, I have a degree, a small but growing following, a debut album just weeks away and the knowledge that I will be successful. That’s no small feat.

#MentalHealth

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His parents Kathleen and Tony were increasingly concerned about him as he found it more and more dif cult to nd the motivation to get ready, leave the house or go to school. But now he is writing and releasing his own rap and pop music, has learnt to play instruments, and is looking forward to a career in music...and credits Noise Solution and his tutor, Michael, for helping him to ful l his potential Kie had not been able to engage with any therapies until he was referred to Noise Solution, which runs online and in-person sessions in Essex “I met up with Michael at the gym, we met in the coffee shop every week and then the sessions moved into a studio,” he said. “It was different to what I was used to, and it gave me a reason to get up and out.

“It gave me con dence and I started to believe what I was capable of. It led to me writing my rst song, and now I have released some music on Spotify, and the whole experience had helped me to determine what I want to be.

Kie did the programme in 2019, and said he believes it gave him the skills to cope with the pandemic when it hit in early 2020 “I wrote a lot of songs during the lockdowns, and used the time to work on my knowledge of writing and producing music. Without having done Noise Solution, my experience over the last two years would have been completely different. It helped me to deal with the pandemic. I would 100% recommend Noise Solution to other people.

Mum Kathleen said: “Noise Solution was brilliant – we had reached a point where we were so worried about Kie, but he completely engaged with the programme and enjoyed going to the sessions, and we got out cheeky Kie back.

Dad Tony said: “We were really impressed with the programme and want to raise awareness of it so more people can get access to it. It was great.

#MentalHealth

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Kie

Seventeen-year-old Kie said his experience of Noise Solution has changed the course of his life. As a 14-year-old, Kie had been struggling with his mental health following a family bereavement.

Outputs: Who we’re working with

65% completion

Employed 29 musicians to work individually 1:1 with over 150 young people in challenging circumstances

Amongst a population of individuals (unfairly) labelled ‘hardest to reach’ with histories of non-engagement

Age bands

Our online provision now means we can reach participants anywhere in the country.

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Delivered 2948 hours of music mentoring over the last year.

We are changing the way we capture the gender identity of our participants. In the next month or so each participant will be able to identify their own gender (and pronouns) when they log in to our system. We expect these percentages to change.

<11

11-14

14-17

85% attendance

17-21

21-25

>25

60% male 30% female 1% non-binary 9% prefer not to say

SDT says that by encouraging psychological needs we improve wellbeing, so that’s what we measure. We use the SWEMBS* scale to do this. The wellbeing data collected from each participant’s ‘MyStream’ means we have a LIVE detailed picture of what changes we see in wellbeing and where, demographically, those changes are occurring

94% start below the national average shifting to over 60% nishing above, at or within 2 points of the national average (compared against a sample of 30,000 responses nationally) Our improvements in wellbeing have been independently estimated to be worth over a million pounds a year in savings to families and systems (report available here) Young women's’ wellbeing increases are twice as high as young men’s Meaningful change across all ages and genders Halved low levels of wellbeing for the last 240 completing the course Improvement in wellbeing for those completing has been a statistical probability for the last six years (p.001, at a completion rate of 65%)

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*To read about the evidence base for Shortened Warwick and Edinburgh Mental Wellbeing Scale you can read this report from ‘what works wellbeing’ .

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Outcomes: Measuring what matters

“Noise solution is an organisation that demonstrates outcomes and this makes it stand out in the sea of different providers.

They are able to provide the commissioner with evaluation data via their unique process of constant evaluation via Blogs and media.

Noise Solution can demonstrate outcomes better than anyone else I know in their field” Stuart Hudson, Strategic Lead for Suffolk Family Focus School Attendance Service

Family and Carers’ Voices Behind each set of data is a young person, their family and their support network. We want to hear and learn from them, so we’ve automated the collection of feedback in the form of easy to use video feedback - that gets sent directly into our platform

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My son at the time he was having his noise solutions session had no other support and was profoundly depressed. He doesn’t like online counselling sessions or text based services which is really all that was available during lockdown. He thrives on interaction with people and the fact that noise solutions is fun and totally di erent from anything else he’d tried it didn’t feel like therapy or forced. The music gave the sessions a purpose and just by giving him time out of that negative headspace he’d become trapped in. I think it helped my son as the sessions aren’t directly focused on talking about or solving your young persons mental health issues as such but de nitely can boost self esteem through achievement and just gives them something else to think about.

“For a kid that is in the middle of an emotional storm, music can be a great life saving ring buoy”

"Thank you so much for all that you have done for him when he rst came to you he was a sad and damaged boy, but we have seen his con dence increase and his smile return. For the rst time in forever, he is up and excited to go to something. You have a gift at supporting young people and we are so thankful he came to you"

Automated collection of video re ections from stakeholders

Getting natural responses

Professionals’ Voices “I can’t speak highly enough, about NS and the work they do with our CYP. It has literally been a life saver in more than one case and the only stability factor in many more. NS have been used successfully for our most vulnerable CYP not accessing education and it has been a comprehensive and therapeutic way to support our children to get back into thinking about this as a possibility. NS have also been used to successfully support known tricky transitions e.g. school settings, placements etc.”

Social worker

“I have worked with colleagues in Noise Solution for nearly a decade. I can’t speak highly enough of the team. Every young person that has engaged with NS provision has been positively impacted.”

Virtual School

“In terms of interventions, it is probably the best intervention I have encountered. This programme transforms lives.” Teacher

“The more the team around the child or young person engages with the online platform, views, listens, and comments, the more the child or young person bene ts. However, the standalone work completed by the tutors helps raise our children holistically in all areas of their lives. Noise solutions work supports our children’s aspirations and futures through the full spectrum of music. Wonderful.

Thank you.” Teacher

“In 2020/2021, Student A’s unauthorised absence was 37%. This is now below 7%.

Lateness marks have decreased from three times a week to one a week. Most of the time, he is not late at all.If Student A is late, this is only for ten minutes, not over two hours. There have been no occasions where he has walked o site. But most importantly, he is engaged in his studies, he is on target or above for the majority of his subjects . Last academic year, he only had 86 positive points for the whole of the academic year. This year, he has already achieved 270 positive points and he still has a term to go”.

PRU professional

That automated ability to collect natural feedback works just as well with professionals as it does with families and carers

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Musicians’ Voices We are lucky enough to have a wide variety of talented musicians, versed in songwriting and digital production, who excel at using music as a vehicle to have positive social outcomes with young people again and again.

A small selection of the 29 musician’s we have worked with this year

“Nothing compares to the feeling that I am having a positive impact on somebody” Jay Goodrich “I enjoy working with fantastic young people of all genders, guiding them in creating their own music production and video production… including young female participants who have then progressed onto Radio 1’s "Future 1000' - a new national training programme all about getting more young women into the music industry through DJ skills” Zoe Phillips “I have encouraged the women to nd what it is good about them to draw on when creating. The work will then speak for itself and be undeniable.” Saran Headman

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Noise Solution out and about and in the media As ever it has been a busy year for Noise Solution. We’ve been appearing on radio, TV , presenting at various Universities and conferences to talk about the approach, practice, theory and evidence for the work we do.

Amongst others, this year saw us talking with or presenting to:

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BBC Su olk BBC Look East East Anglian Daily Times Bury Free Press York University Cambridge University Business Masters students British Education Research Association Digital Innovation in Music Conference Dr Phil Mullin’s book launch PwC Salesforce Non Pro t Conference East of England Leadership Academy Music and Prevention - Youth Justice Conference TiME Connectivity online conference

View the BBC feature on Sophie’s experience here

The Future We are only scratching the surface of what is possible. We want to continue developing our impact capture and management tools, and share these tools widely to improve impact capture and analysis across our sector and beyond.

We are actively trying to grow Noise Solution, so we can take our proven impacts to as many people as possible.

We want to continue researching what works, learning from this research and nding ways to apply it to our work.

We know we can do things better, and we want to keep doing that.

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(01284) 771156

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