What is Well Together :)
Well together :) is a children's centre/school based community mental health project developed by QES Consulting, focussing on promoting the ethos of community mental health wellbeing. Well together :) is developed through the collaborative working of the local authority’s Community Mental Health Team (Community Health Service: First Steps Early Intervention Service) and Local Education Authority. The Extended Services teams or schools and the Psychology Team from Community Mental Health are usually the operational teams working on Well Together :).

What is the aim of Well Together :)
The aim of Well Together is to use children's centres and schools as a base from which to promote mental health awareness and to improve family and community understanding of mental well-being. Initially,it is an exploratory process that allows for all stakeholders to be actively involved. By stakeholders we mean the children, families, teachers, school/ children's centre leadership, the local community, the local education authority and the National Health Service. The entire process is informed by community psychology principles.

The Well Together :) Process
Initially, the team meets with the children's centre and school leadership team to engage the support of leadership and to agree on communication and management protocols. Additionally, the team will discuss the needs of the children's centre community and outline the services could be made available to anticipated service users. The team anticipates that the service users are families that interact with the children's centre/school and the local and children's centre/school community. The team will use the Extended Services audits to ensure that unnecessary duplication or overlap of services does not occur. The next stage would be to hold consultation sessions with children, families and the community to develop an understanding of the mental health needs of the community and suggest ways to support mental health wellbeing. In the implementation phase, the Community Mental Health Team can offer workshops and drop-in informative sessions for families and the communities (twilight sessions or coffee mornings). Finally, the team will then evaluate the process and use the results to inform a regular children's centre/school based community health service.

The Well Together :) Outcome
The outcome of this pilot is that children, families and communities that access the service, would find it easier to talk about mental health and perceive mental health in the same light as any other health concern – to be managed by promoting well-being and having no stigma attached to getting support.

Evaluation of Well Together :)
Evaluation of the impact of Well Together :) will be done via a combination of quantitative surveys and questionnaires together with qualitative focus group evaluation session led by each sector represented within the team. Case studies will then be authored to provide a comprehensive view of the impact of Well Together :) from an individual service user’s or group of service user’s point of view.