In September 2010, the Tavistock Institute of Human Relations was commissioned by the London Borough of Tower Hamlets to carry out an evaluation of the local Prevent projects funded between 2008 and 2011. This work builds on our earlier Prevent-evaluation activities in this field, which have included: a
methodological paper commissioned by the Department of Communities and Local Government (CLG) to inform the national evaluation of Prevent activities; the development of
self-evaluation guidelines and a resource pack for local Prevent programmes and delivery of regional
workshops to introduce local staff to these guidelines.
Tower Hamlets has been involved in the Prevent programme from its early stages, with its initial Pathfinder projects followed by three further tranches of local projects, supported by a number of cross-cutting activities. Since 2008, the Council has funded a total of 25 projects. The overall purpose of the evaluation was to get a deeper understanding of the achievements and outcomes of the local Prevent projects that were delivered between 2008 and 2011, as part of the Council’s Preventing Violent Extremism Strategy. It was deemed important to make this a ‘learning evaluation’, capturing the journey of the projects in terms of what worked, what didn’t; the challenges encountered and the successes achieved.