Early Years Initiative Evaluation: the impact on children, families and communities of community-driven, evidence-informed actions to improve outcomes in children from birth to the start of full-time school in four diverse Western Australian communities.

The Early Years Initiative (EYI) began in 2018 as a ten-year project and is underpinned by a view that communities, informed by relevant scientific evidence and with sufficient capacity-building, are best placed to design, implement, and evaluate solutions to meet their needs. The four partner communities involved in the EYI (one each of metropolitan, regional, remote, and very remote communities) will be supported by the State Government and the Minderoo Foundation to design, implement, review and adapt locally-driven activities that will be pursued to improve development, health, and learning outcomes for children and families within their community. For example, they may introduce a model of 'community connectors' to reduce isolation among 'difficult to reach' families and increase their engagement with existing services; or they may establish a weekly 'community cook-up' event to improve food security and healthy eating in low income households with young children. The duration of activities will run from the time each Community Plan is endorsed through to 2028. The evaluation of impact of the EYI comprises six modules reflecting the objectives of the EYI articulated in the Initiative's program logic. Module 1: Process Evaluation -> To identify which EYI activities were implemented in each community, for whom and over what duration, and where possible with what intensity, as measured by administrative and EYI process data (not being assessed as part of the current registration record). Module 2: Outcomes Evaluation (this module is the focus of this project registration - i.e. the module that directly measures outcomes for children aged 0-4) --> To determine whether the EYI activities improve the development, health, and learning of children from conception to age four in each community, as measured by changes across three time points (2021 - 2024 - 2027) in linked administrative data collected by key State Government agencies (i.e.: Health, Education and Communities). These retrospective data items will be extracted and linked by the WA Department of Health's Data Linkage Branch and analysed by the research team. These administrative data are collected on children from birth to age four (and their families) and include the Child Headline Indicators, Midwives Notification System, Preschool Collection, the Ages and Stages Questionaire plus Australian Early Development Census (AEDC) data. Module 3: Individual/ Family Mechanisms Impact Evaluation --> To determine (based on changing practices and exposure to community supports, programs, and services; and using a range of individual and group qualitative methods) which activities touched whom and in what contexts, by measuring changes in mechanisms hypothesised to mediate child development, health, and learning, i.e.: a) Parenting practices; b) Family functioning; c) Service access, quality, and use; and d) Collaboration between services. Data for this module will be collected via 15-20 minute surveys of parent/caregivers (conducted at three-year intervals by child health professionals when parent/caregivers attend universal health checks with their children from birth to age four), surveys of service providers administered by the research team at three-year intervals, and through focus groups with volunteer parents to pursue emerging lines of enquiry that arise from survey findings (not being assessed as part of the current registration record). Module 4: Community Mechanisms/Impact -> To measure the process of community capacity-building (not being assessed as part of the current registration record). Module 5: Lessons Learnt --> To describe the process of operationalisation of the EYI by the partner organisations in each of the four communities and how findings are translated into scalable policy, if appropriate (not being assessed as part of the current registration record). Module 6: Economic Evaluation --> to measure the cost-effectiveness of EYI as an approach by comparing the program costs with outcomes achieved (not being assessed as part of the current registration record).