Pro Bono Economics worked with West London Zone to examine the potential economic outcomes of their programme of support for children facing multiple disadvantages in west London. 

West London is an area of high inequality resulting in thousands of children in need of help to thrive. West London Zone works with students aged 13-18 who live in the area and currently receive insufficient support to achieve their potential. They provide a bespoke, two-year programme tailored to the young people’s personal goals that aims to teach them the skills which will allow them to flourish into adulthood.

The West London Zone programme targets four outcome areas – emotional wellbeing, peer relationships, academic attainment and confidence. This project identified evidence that could quantify a link between the first two of these outcomes and future risks of exclusion and truancy at school, as well as employment, earnings and health outcomes for beneficiaries.

Unfortunately, at present, insufficient evidence is available to robustly quantify the full economic value of improvements in the academic attainment and confidence of the young people participating in West London Zone’s programme. As such it was not possible to give a full view of the benefits delivered by the programme.

Pro Bono Economics will continue to provide advice and support to West London Zone to further develop the evidence of their impact and provide a more complete picture of their economic impact in the future.