Digital Day Service - A Community Hub

If you visit Hartlepool, you may come across one of their many Community Hubs. Take a look inside and you’ll find a place to meet people, a place to eat, a library and lots of events and activities for you to join. The Community Hubs of Hartlepool are relied on by many in the community as a place to seek help, to socialise, and to learn.

So, when lockdown hit, Hartlepool Council knew they needed a digital alternative for anyone who couldn’t get to a community hub in person. Having worked with focusgov before, Hartlepool contacted us to develop the idea further and the idea of a Digital Day Service was born.

Day Services have been a key part of adult social care in the community but how to maintain that socialisation during COVID and times of shielding, when vulnerable people are no longer able to physically visit Community Centres and Hubs to meet friends, get advice, take part in activities that benefit their physical and mental health?

Hartlepool were spending budget and staff resources on distributing devices across the community for Zoom/Teams based activities but were hitting lots of problems in terms of installation, account setup and staff needing to be 'in situ' with users. A much simpler solution that was easy for Hartlepool Borough Council to support was required.

Working closely with focusgov to identify the key features needed to take the Community Hub experience online, in partnership with Hartlepool Council we came up with a brief for a new kind of digital day service.

Based on the existing brand recognition of the ‘Hartlepool Now’ website (a central location for Hartlepool’s community information, including their SEND Local Offer and Community Support Finder that was also made in collaboration with focusgov) we decided to name the new Digital Day Service ‘All Together Now’ which also echoes the Hub’s community spirit.

The key features of All Together Now are:

The Café

Designed to look like an illustrative version of a Community Hub cafe, this is where you go to meet new people or just catch up with your friends. You can nominate buddies so you’ll be notified on the homepage when they enter the cafe.

Just like a real café, there will be 'guests' running drop-in sessions. You can come along to speak to an occupational therapist during their clinic or perhaps someone from the council.

With added safety features you can safely enjoy your time in the café with the support of an admin.

Sessions

Do you want to learn a new skill like cookery, backgammon, or maybe yoga? The Hartlepool Community Hubs often hold classes to unite the community and provide adult learning resources.

It was important that we have a digital alternative to keep these options open to everyone and not just those who can reach a Hub.

With sessions, you can book a class, or a talk online and then join the call at the start time. You can pick up a new hobby from your own home and interact with the instructors in a way you wouldn’t get from a video alone.

One-to-one calls

Sometimes interactions with professionals need to be more one-on-one and Hartlepool will hold drop-ins with professionals such as occupational therapists so you can get the advice you need. With one-to-one calls, you know that you can safely get the same experience without the worry that your conversation will be interrupted.

Nowplay

Nowplay is All Together Now’s version of the digital library. This houses videos that Hartlepool thinks will be of interest as well as recordings of previous public sessions so you can watch them back if you can’t make it.

Hartlepool are currently rolling All Together Now out to the community and hopes that with the help of this technology, we can avoid leaving people isolated, whatever the future may hold.

To find out more or to discuss how a Digital Day Service could help your local area, give us a call on 0117 949 8008 or email hello@focusgov.co.uk