Dear All,

I am writing to ask an immense favour. We have put together an online 
Questionnaire at http://www.otherpeopleschildren.org.uk, which aims to 
strengthen our understanding of audience and potential audience for the 
Archive and Study Centre, and to support a major grant application for a 
project entitled  "Therapeutic Living With Other People's Children: An 
oral history of residential therapeutic child care c. 1930 - c. 1980".


The Planned Environment Therapy Trust Archive and Study Centre was 
founded in 1989. It is the only Archive and Study Centre devoted to 
therapeutic community environments in the world, and we depend upon the 
diverse community we serve to keep us on our toes, alert to their needs 
and to new ways in which we can extend our resources and services to 
them and to the widest possible public. For the Archive and Study Centre 
website, see http://www.pettarchiv.org.uk


We are in the midst of a major grant application to the Heritage Lottery 
Fund which has come out of our work with former children, families and 
staff of therapeutic communities for children and young people. In this 
project we are trying to apply everything we have learned over the past 
twenty years to help meet their needs for place and foundation, and to 
introduce the wider community to an area of the national life and 
heritage which is immensely rich - challenging, but with tremendous 
rewards in learning and understanding. To find out more about 
"Therapeutic Living With Other Peoples Children: residential therapeutic 
child care c. 1930 - c. 1980", and the principles underlying it,  please 
see http://news.otherpeopleschildren.org.uk.

We have been awarded a development grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund 
to help us to prepare the strongest application possible by the 
submission deadline of August 28, 2009. Your help is essential.
 
By taking ten to fifteen minutes to answer the questionnaire at 
http://www.otherpeopleschildren.org.uk you will help to strengthen the 
application tremendously, by providing detailed information on audiences 
and potential audiences for the Archive and Study Centre and the Oral 
History project itself. Having said which:  All the online 
questionnaires are answered anonymously, and though we do ask some 
age/gender/profession-type questions, no identifying information is 
gathered, and these questions are only there to help us understand the 
who, where, if, and how of the current and possible audience. Yes, the 
questionnaire is more verbose than one put together by professional 
pollsters - anyone who knows me will not be surprised by that; but, yes, 
we are also very very grateful for your willingness to complete it. It 
should take no more than 10 to 15 minutes, according to all of the 
trials so far.

Your feedback on the questionnaire itself is also very welcome.

If you wish to be on our mailing list, and be kept up to date with the 
progress of the "Other Peoples Children" application, project and other 
things, please email me directly - [log in to unmask]

The Questionnaire is at http://www.otherpeopleschildren.org.uk.

With very many thanks, for your help,

Craig

-- 
Dr. Craig Fees, RMSA
Archivist
Planned Environment Therapy Trust Archive and Study Centre
Church Lane
Toddington near Cheltenham
Glos. GL54 5DQ
United Kingdom

01242 620125
http://www.pettarchiv.org.uk

Keep up to date with Archive News, Events and Recent Accessions: The Archive and study Centre blog at http://news.pettarchiv.org.uk/