Improvement Service

This guide outlines some approaches to working with care leavers that worked well for projects funded through the Big Lottery Fund’s Young People’s Fund (YPF). It draws on wider evidence from organisations involved in supporting young people in care and care leavers. The guide describes some of the issues affecting children and young people in care - abuse and neglect; instability in care arrangements; inadequate follow-up upon leaving the care system - and provides advice and good examples of practice to illustrate some successful approaches.

This guide outlines the approaches to working with young carers that have been successful for projects funded through the Big Lottery Fund’s Young People’s Fund (YPF). It provides advice and practical examples to help work with young carers. The guide identifies lessons which reflect the experiences of YPF projects and other organisations working with the target group, and looks at the benefits of actively involving young carers in activities away from home and how to engage young carers in these activities.

This guide outlines the approaches taken by projects funded through the Big Lottery Fund’s Young People’s Fund (YPF) to engaging young people in learning and reducing their risk of being “Not in Education, Employment or Training” (NEET). It provides advice, practical examples and sources of further information and support for how to work to re-engage young people in education and develop their personal, social and employability skills.

...or are at risk of offending. This guide outlines the approaches and activities which have worked well for the Big Lottery Fund’s Young People’s Fund (YPF) projects in engaging and supporting young people who have offended or are at risk of offending. It provides advice, practical examples and sources of further information and support that may be useful when working with this group. It considers the benefits of diversionary activities which provide opportunities for young people to build trust in others and gain confidence before they progress to more focused and targeted interventions, and argues that intervention helps break links with negative peer hierarchies and helps young people learn and put into practice new social norms in terms of behaviour.

Final report of a project that brought together care leavers in Argyll and Bute with their corporate parents (throughcare and aftercare, social work, health, homelessness and education services), to explore what a co-productive approach could look like in the social work sector. The project focused upon the social and emotional care of care leavers as they move on from care. The report shares the learning from using a co-productive process, as well as reflections and recommendations for using the approach.

A collection of audio and video recordings concerning recent research on child care and protection topics. These were conducted between January and March 2012 and involved a number of academics, who specialise in particular areas of child care research, speaking about the subject of their project, the main findings, and the implications for policy and practice. The project is a partnership of IRISS and MARS/SCCPN.

Protecting children more effectively through better support for front line social work practice. Ofsted report on how senior managers in 14 local authorities have implemented a range of strategies to improve support for front-line staff working in child protection. The report highlights the features of effective support, discussing supportive organisational cultures, professional supervision, recruitment and retention, team working, managing performance, learning and development, and multi-agency working. It suggests that effective support can help to overcome obstacles to improving outcomes for children and young people, such as a lack of resources, a lack of time to work with families and high caseloads.

Guidance for local authorities from the National Youth Agency on commissioning high quality services for young people. It includes practical information on how to involve young people in commissioning.

A paper from the Child Public Health Special Interest Group which calls for a new approach to tackling child poverty in the UK. It argues that a new approach should embrace a more comprehensive understanding of the effects of poverty and that evaluation and monitoring mechanisms need to go beyond changing political directions and short term funding cycles.

Family interventions were set up to work with some of the most troubled and challenging families to tackle anti-social behaviour, youth crime, inter-generational disadvantage and worklessness. They take an intensive and persistent multi-agency approach to supporting families to overcome their problems, coordinated by a single dedicated ‘key worker’. This Department for Education report provides an analysis of the families involved in Family Intervention Projects (FIPs) and examines the outcomes of these FIPs. It includes the results of an impact study of FIPs which focus on anti-social behaviour and looks at the extent to which families supported by FIPs have been able to sustain successful outcomes nine to fourteen months after exiting a family intervention. It also discusses the factors associated with sustained success.

Research from the National Foundation for Educational Research which explores how children's centre services are targeting the most disadvantaged families. Drawing on a literature review and case studies in six English local authority areas, it looks at: who children's services are targeting; how the greatest need is being defined; the data children's centres use; how centres identify and prioritise families in greatest need; and how effective services are developed for those in greatest need.

This report considers the potential impact of a package of preventative and early interventions to improve outcomes for children and families in Scotland. It presents estimated costs per child for a range of interventions including family nurse partnerships, ante-natal support for substance abuse, and smoking cessation in pregnancy, estimated annual costs for a package of early interventions and discusses the potential impact on public spending.

The first report of Community Links' Early Action Task Force presents ideas for interventionist services to help children and young people. The report argues for a shift in culture from dealing with problems when they arise towards early action projects/interventions. It puts forward the social, financial and economic case for early action, sets out a definition of early action and offers a classification of different types of early action such as teaching parenting skills, crime prevention measures, youth work and mentoring. It also identifies some of the barriers to implementing early action initiatives, particularly the lack of evidence of the long-term impact of interventions, lack of co-ordination between levels of government and agencies, and financial constraints. It includes examples of projects run by voluntary sector organisations.

The report from the National Foundation for Educational Research provides guidance for local authorities and their partners on how to produce and assess the business case for early interventions. It looks at the concept of early intervention services, discusses what should be included in good business case, and sets out what what should be considered in evaluating value for money.

This report from Ofsted analyses a small sample of 11 local authorities and their partner agencies and looks at how services successfully support young people who are at risk of entering care to remain living at home. It draws on the experiences and views of 43 families, including those of the young people themselves, their parents or carers and the key professionals and managers who were involved in coordinating and providing support services. The overriding message is that it is the key worker who is crucial in helping families successfully stay together. Practitioners’ persistency, reliability, openness and frank nature helped them to engage with families who previously would have been difficult to approach. The report also finds that successful intervention requires strong multi-agency working both operationally and strategically, combined with clearly understood and consistent decision-making processes, and investment in services to address young people and their family’s needs.