Listen Project in Cabra Enabling Youth Counselling Service to Expand Capacity
Listen Project in Cabra Enabling Youth Counselling Service to Expand Capacity
The Listen Project in Cabra
The Listen Project was originally established in Dublin 17 in 2013 due to a shared local concern about youth suicide. Originally targeting 60 young people with 280 counselling sessions. Over the next 11 years more than 1,400 young people have been engaged, resulting in over 3,600 attended youth counselling sessions with the Listen Project. In 2022, Cabra For Youth joined the Listen Project, and the service was extended to the Cabra region.
The Listen Project provides a safe space in Listen Sessions with a qualified Counsellor for young people to talk, feel heard and reflect on issues that are important for them. Listen Sessions are offered to provide meaningful support. Participating in all the Listen Sessions allows the Counsellor to support young people to recognise their own strengths and learn new coping skills. This then leads to more confidence and feeling more hopeful about the future.
The Listen Project is a referral and appointment service. Young people 12 – 21 years in the Dublin 17, 13, 5 and 7 regions who are not currently engaged in any counselling service provision. It is an early intervention support service for young people, focusing on wellbeing. More significant mental health challenges are not be suitable for the Listen Project.
Referrals are made via a free phone number and the sessions take place in youth friendly settings, and in schools in the catchment area. The project is a collaboration involving 5 local organisations and is managed by a steering group with the support of external clinical governance expertise. It operates without the requirement for long waiting lists at times that work for young people.
Innovative programme developed to increase capacity
As demand for the service grew, there was a significant challenge in recruiting and retaining additional suitably qualified counsellors to work with young people in our communities. This was due in part to our capacity as a community-based service with limited resources to afford the higher rates of pay.
A response was devised in partnership with PCI College to develop Listen Up – a bespoke programme for qualified counsellors accredited as a Professional Certificate in Child and Adolescent Counselling. The course content covered most of the competencies on the IACP Standards for working with Under 18s as well as participants being able to use the cert as RPL (Recognition of Prior Learning) in their application (if they want to continue) on to the Middlesex University validated MSc in Child and Adolescent Psychotherapy with PCI College.
This course was fully subsidised by Sláintecare Healthy Communities, with a required placement component in lieu of course fees. Participating counsellors were required to complete 60 attended counselling sessions in local schools or youth centres as part of the Listen Up Programme. In recognition of their commitment, a stipend of €25 per session attended was paid.
From course development to delivery and feedback
A three phase plan was put in place by the Sláintecare Local Development Officer for Cabra and the project partners to take it through from inception to reviewing the learning outcomes.
Phase 1: Explore new initiative idea
| Areas | Actions |
| Course Development and Evaluation | Engage with PCI College: Number of meetings to review
|
| Funding | Meeting with local Sláintecare Local Development Officer to discuss Listen Up Completion and submission of relevant paperwork |
| Placement | Engage with local schools within all Listen Project Areas to ascertain possibility of 60hr Counsellor Placement Online and in person meetings with Principals, Guidance Counsellors, Home School Liaison Outline requirements for Listen Up Opportunities for schools to ask questions, give input in relation to their school needs |
| Sourcing suitable candidates | Advertisement took place on relevant platforms Open evening (online) to promote the Listen Up Programme Creation and dissemination of application form |
| Candidate Selection | Shortlisting of candidates- 75 applications for 12 places Online interviews with shortlisted candidates Gathering of required documentation/deposit for successful candidates – e.g. qualifications, references, supervisor details, insurance details, etc. Offer of place on the course |
Phase 2: Funding secured
| Areas | Actions |
| Listen Up Procedures | Updating Listen Project operational procedures manual and preparing course handbook Preparing Listen Up resource folder for course participants Information session for salesforce customer relationship management system Engagement of Group Supervisor for Group supervision |
| Course delivery | Course dates took place over 6 Saturdays in Sphere 17 |
| Garda Vetting and Placement Co-ordination | Meeting all candidates to discuss placement needs and to complete Garda vetting |
| School | Online meeting with interested schools – Confirmation of participatory schools, assigning counsellors to specific schools, clarifying referral procedures Development and completion of contract for participating schools Candidates met with relevant school link person Informal check ins mid-way |
| Placement support | Online meeting for salesforce client management system Mid way check-in with Clinical Oversight Manager |
Phase 3 Capturing the learning
| Areas | Actions |
| PCI College | End of Course Evaluation with all parties from PCI and Listen Project Review and capture learning from Listen Up Pilot |
| School Placement | Development and dissemination of end of pilot evaluation survey Online meeting with schools for final feedback |
| Listen Up Participants | End of placement individual meeting with Clinical Oversight Manager Development and completion of survey for additional feedback |
| Listen Project | Administration follow up with individual counsellors (Salesforce and invoices) |
| Celebration Event | Graduation Ceremony in Sphere 17 |
Capacity built to provide youth counselling in the Community
The Listen Up Programme significantly increased the capacity of the Listen Project to provide young people with access to youth counselling. It resulted in an additional 81 young people attending 701 counselling sessions.
This represents an increase in young people of 65%, and an increase in attended session of 121%, based on a comparable period for the Listen Project youth counselling service prior to the Listen Up Programme.
The total cost of the Listen Up Programme was less than €30K.
During the period of the Listen Up Programme (academic year 23/24), based on baseline and review feedback provided in counselling sessions, young people reported feeling:
- 16% more positive about themselves
- 6% more positive about their families
- 8% more positive about their friends/relationships
- 27% more positive about their education/school
- 9% more positive about how they use their free time
- 11% more positive about their future
What Listen Up meant to young people, their parents and their schools?
During the period of the Listen Up Programme, young people also fed back on their experience of the Listen Project via an anonymous voluntary online survey using Jot Form.
To our question – How helpful did you find our service? – our average response rate was 4.72 out of 5. The following are examples of what the young people who took part had to say:
“The girl I worked with was very welcoming and kind, I’m usually very shy when I meet new people, but I felt very comfortable speaking with her, hoping she can come back to my school!!
“The counsellor was an amazing support helping me with my therapy. She has helped me in more ways than she will ever know. She made me feel so comfortable and at ease and really helped me mentally”
Parents were also very grateful for the support, as evidenced in feedback from schools and via the anonymous voluntary online survey. The following are some examples:
“Service excellent. From my very first phone call enquiry to the last session everyone & everything so professional, so helpful & lovely & kind. It is such an amazing valuable service so needed for our teenagers today. It has helped my daughter immensely & I am extremely grateful”
“I will always be so thankful for the support this project has being giving to my son it has really helped his
wellbeing in be able to express his feeling I always be forever grateful to this service”
The Listen Up Programme resulted in 12 additional qualified counsellors developing specific competencies to work with children and adolescents.
Secondary schools had access to counselling resources and reported the value of this service to their school community. Participating schools provided the following feedback:
“We have a huge number of students who have traumatic family experiences and situations which impacts their school performance and behaviour not to mention their mental health”
“The Listen Programme has been invaluable in supporting our students and the results are visible and tangible”.
“The benefit for our students is huge, meeting with an external counsellor who is very experienced has provided a safe space for them to offload and also to receive very useful wellbeing tool”
The increased provision of youth counselling via the Listen Project is addressing many of the recognised barriers to youth mental health services in our communities including costs, waiting lists, stigma, relevance, and accessibility.
Listen Project success leads to 3 year funding commitment
The Listen Up Programme has proven to be both an effective and efficient way to increase the output of youth counselling provision in the target communities across North Dublin, and, consequently, to improving the mental wellbeing outcomes for more young people.
Key to this achievement has been the collaboration and support from Sláintecare workers in our communities. Sláintecare has demonstrated its capacity to identify ways in which it can provide meaningful support to community-based initiatives. The proactive and dynamic approach of the Sláintecare workers in our local areas, and their commitment to understand and support what is needed, led to us securing the funding resources necessary to cover the Listen Up course design and delivery costs. When the project then experienced increased costs, resulting from increased service output, Sláintecare were there again to help. This support and community investment has also been key to us demonstrating the need for, and value of, the Listen Project and the Listen Up Programme.
As a direct result of the achievement of the programme, the HSE has committed to 3-year funding for the Listen Project which will not only cover the Listen Up Programme, and increased youth counselling output, but it will also provide for the first dedicated Listen Project manager moving the Listen Project to a more sustainable footing. This would not be possible were it not for the support of Sláintecare.
In our view, the Listen Project model is a community-based response that not only delivering success that can be measured, but one that can be replicated elsewhere, and we are very open to sharing our experience and learning with other community service providers to this end.
Funding security will mean that we can now commit to running the Listen Up Programme on an annual basis, providing valuable support as testified by participating schools, parents, and young people who have used the service.
“Being able to provide more time to students than what we have the capacity to provide” (Principal from secondary school who participated in Listen Project)
“It really helped our daughter she now talks to us a lot better and has started being with us a lot more. Thank yous so much.” (Parent of young person who participated)
“I thought it was very helpful for me to be more confident in myself and overcome challenges that I struggled with before.”(Young person who participated)
Role of Sláintecare Healthy Communities in delivering the expanded capacity
Sláintecare funding played a pivotal role in expanding the Listen Project, which provides youth counselling services in North Dublin. In 2022, Sláintecare Healthy Communities funding enabled the extension of services to Cabra, allowing Cabra For Youth to join the initiative. A key challenge faced by the Listen Project was the recruitment and retention of qualified counsellors. To address this, Sláintecare funded the development of the “Listen Up” Programme in partnership with PCI College. This programme provided a Professional Certificate in Child and Adolescent Counselling and was fully subsidised, with participating counsellors completing 60 attended sessions as part of their training.
The Listen Project increased its counselling capacity by 65%, with an additional 81 young people benefiting from 701 sessions during the programme’s initial phase. The support from Sláintecare not only covered course development but also helped secure a more sustainable future for the Listen Project through a three-year commitment from the HSE.
If you would like to know more about this project or about other initiatives happening in the Cabra/Finglas Sláintecare Healthy Communities the Local Development Officer can be contacted here
