One of the central aims of SHINE is to equip the school community with the skills needed to take a data-driven approach to school improvement planning and to be able to access health and wellbeing research. Alongside this, SHINE aims to improve the data-infrastructure available to Scottish schools.
With these aims in mind,SHINE has been exploring the potential of introducing data linkage to the SHINE pupil mental health survey. This is a research method of bringing information from different sources (e.g., health and education records) together about the same person to create a new, richer dataset. Data linkage allows for associations to be identified that would otherwise be difficult to determine and can lead to better policy making and provision planning. As part of this exploration, SHINE wants to build understanding of this exciting type of research across our network.
We created a short video explaining the process and benefit of data linkage research, based on consultation work with school-aged children, parents, and teaching staff. The video was designed to explain data linkage in an accessible manner to allow pupils and parents to make an informed decision about consenting to their data being used for this type of research. The creation of this video was the first step in exploring the potential of this type of research within the school community and sharing research expertise around data linkage with the wider school community.
SHINE received funding from DATAMIND UK and Research Data Scotland (RDS) to carry out this work and presented at the RDS public engagement showcase event on the 20th of February. If you would like to hear more about this work, please contact: mary.wilson@glasgow.ac.uk.