ByUz4Uz

In early January 2002, Youth Media were approached by the leaving care team who have residence within the power house. The brief was to design an innovative form of media by which of CD Card.

The residents had full control of the content of the card, which was to project a pathway plan for an individual who required the services of the leaving care team, Connexions, Health, and facilities within the Powerhouse.

This card has been developed on the cutting edge of multimedia, reaching the boundaries of technology. The card contains 36Mb of interactive content by use of tools such as Macromedia Flash MX, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe

Illustrator, Paint Shop Pro 7, and Sound Forge, ACID Pro. The project had a 10 week build program which utilised the wide range of facilities that the Powerhouse had to offer, ranging from designing the format using Apple PowerMac G4s, to using state of the art PCs to edit and create music and sound, and using the radio and mixing facilities to record music and voiceovers.

The design was based upon cartoon caricatures which best represented a wide range of modern cultural backgrounds, ie. Gothic, Punk, Mosher, Pop, and so on. The user was able to choose a caricature from a list which they believed best suited their personality. Their choice was then used to illustrate helpful services which were made available by the leaving care team, NHS health and Connexions Merseyside.

The residents of the Powerhouse involved, by using the facilities made available, designed a concept of a pathway planner for the card to introduce information on the facilities and help on offer when first becoming part of the leaving care program.

Staff from Youth Media were close at hand with the development of the card, and also enjoyed the opportunity to experience some of the facilities and technology the Powerhouse had to offer.The team involved in the making of the card all had individual qualities to bring the project together, for example when mixing copyright free music to best represent a theme for the users choice of caricature, to designing the look and style of their caricature, to deciding on the best way to layout and present the content involved.

The project was a successful venture which hopefully will help lay the foundation for other projects to utilise the facilities available in the Powerhouse environment, which has also proven the powerhouse can help to best present and develop the skills and qualities everybody has to offer.

The News section in Issue 12 of Quality Protects features a report on the By Uz 4 Uz project.A copy of this report in PDF format can be viewed by clicking on http://www.doh.gov.uk/qualityprotects/info/publications/12_1-7.pdf

CASE STUDY

Young people leaving care in Liverpool now have a powerful tool to help them face the wider world – a library that’s the size of a credit card! The library is in fact a CD-ROM packed full of information about a wide range of health issues including drugs, hormones, fitness, alcohol, diet, sexuality, stress, and contraception.

It also explains what statutory services the young people are entitled to receive and details training and education opportunities available. “The reception has been fantastic. Young people love it,” says Carolyn Connor,    a resource manager in the Liverpool Leaving Care Service. "A lot of these young people live on their own.  They don’t have the privilege of having mums and dads they can ask things like, ‘Are my bits all right?’ and ‘Should this be happening?
“We wanted to produce something funky that would answer this sort of question and that young people would actually want to use.  When you give them an information pack, they simply dump it in the nearest bin.”

A 12-strong group of young people who are or have been in care helped produce the CD with Youth Media, all gaining IT qualifications in the process.  Several have been offered job opportunities as a result.  One of those who appears on the CD is Alan Parkinson, aged 22, who spent a lot of time in care between the ages of nine and 13.

“It’s very funny and streetwise – a much more interesting way of finding out information than a dreary black and white document.  Basically, it gets across the point that there is help out there.  You don’t have to do it all on your own when you leave care.”