Children's Services - Completed Projects
Below is a summary of each of the Children's Services Programme projects. Documentation relating to the programme can be found on the Key Products page.
- Provided an information database tol support commissioners across the region, in developing services and managing the market
- Facilitated the development of regional and/or sub-regional resources to meet identified need
- Supported commissioners and operational managers in identifying appropriate provision for children and young people who will need a placement outside of in-house provision and matching need to provision
- Ensured value for money is achieved in the making of individual placements
Recruitment of Foster Carers Regional Feasibility Study
- Established the business case for a regional approach to joint recruitment and development of in-house foster carers.
Collaborative Fostering Services Feasibility Study
- Established the business case for a regional approach to joint recruitment and development of in-house foster carers.
Workforce Data Framework and Analysis
- Agreed a common understanding of workforce planning across stakeholders and partner agencies
- Ascertained what constitutes the Children's Core and Wider Workforce
- Agreed regionally, a minimum data set for the Children's Workforce
- Agreed methodology for data collection
- Produced detailed data sets that inform decision making around the current and future Children's Workforce.
Tees Valley Shared Training Assessment
- Developeed a shared collaborative process for the marketing, recruitment and training of local authority foster carers across the Tees Valley Authorities in order to identify efficiencies and increase carer numbers.
Workforce Voluntary and Community Sector Engagement
- Increased the involvement and integration of the CYPF VCS in the development, implementation and review of children's workforce strategies and activities
- Increased opportunities for the CYPF VCS to access a range of training and workforce reform opportunities across the region
- Supported local infrastructure arrangements to build the capacity of the CYPF VCS to enable them to fully participate in the design, delivery and evaluation of services to children, young people and families
Workforce Leadership and Management
- To realise the vision for leaders and managers across children's services as defined in Building Brighter Futures (DCSF 2008): "Resilient, well informed, creative and innovative leaders with the requisite skills, knowledge and experience to ensure the effective delivery of integrated provision for children, young people and families at the local level"
- To develop collaborative approaches to workforce reform which add value to local Children's Services Workforce Development Strategies.
North of Tyne Integrated Learning Disability and Difficulty Services Pilot
For local authorities:
- Improved ability to meet need locally - market development and stewardship
- Clearer focus on current and future cost control
- Shared strategic capacity - VFM
- Improved capacity to deliver and monitor outcomes
- Better skill base for business partnership management
- For children and families:
- Improved outcomes for children
- Improved contact with their home communities
- Improved home based support, including therapies
- Easier access to regular respite through consistent link with developing Aiming High provision.
Parenting - Think Family ISSP Project Pilot
- Develop and embrace an holistic approach to improving a range of outcomes of families experiencing multiple vulnerabilities (domestic violence, drugs and alcohol, impact of poverty)
- Develop a model of practice to reduce assessments undertaken on families/individual family members
- Develop strong prevention model for offending
- Apply an equal focus on siblings of young offenders
- Relieve economic family stress by direct commissioning for the family
- Reduce costs of involvement in families
Applying Outcomes Based Accountability
- Audit which Local Authorities have implemented an Outcome Based Accountability (OBA) model and those who have not;
- Undertake a benefits realisation study;
- Share the benefits identified from this study by designing a regional toolkit for dissemination;
- Encourage the principles of learning and mentoring amongst peer-groups
- Evaluate the business benefits derived from the project and any lessons learnt
- Corporate parenting DVD & teaching materials designed for Lead Members in Children's Services
Developing Capacity and Leadership in Children's Services
- To support the professional development of Directors of Children's Services within the North East through exploration of a number of 'hot topics'.
- To support Directors of Children's Services to develop new thinking, ways of working to tackle important issues and explore opportunities for collaboration within the region.
- Deliver a facilitated bi-monthly programme of development sessions
Programme Evaluation
- To evaluate the two pilot projects to determine if they have met their objectives and are scaleable regionally
- It will also seek to evaluate the overall Children's Services programme
- Apply OBA model to improving Teenage Pregnancy outcomes
- Develop regional OBA network
- Safeguarding - procure the provision of evidence based research to support the development of models of intervention, regional policies and procedures, and understanding around unannounced inspections, serious case reviews and child protection plans to the ensure the effective safeguarding of children within the North East
- Contact -assess the feasibility of creating collaborative arrangements for the provision of supervised contact sessions for children and their families as determined by the Courts.
- Safeguarding phase 2 delivery-VCSN
Supporting Social Work
- Support the implementation of a regional action plan developed from the regional events looking at "investing in the future of social work"
Supporting North East Breastfeeding Framework
- Support the North East educational institutions, along with Hartlepool PCT and Children's Centres within Hartlepool,to become accredited in the UNICEF Baby Friendly Initiative to ensure a high standard of care for pregnant women and breastfeeding mothers and babies
Supporting the NE Child Poverty Coalition
- To support the work of the North East Child Poverty RAG and the implementation of the regional action plan by funding a regional Child Poverty Co-ordinator.
Feasibility Study Collaborative Recruitment, Retention, Agency Staff Work
- To assess the feasibility of and then implement collaborative arrangements to address two significant regional issues relating to social work - reviewing arrangements for 'growing your own' pool of social workers within the North East, and, developing options for collaborative arrangements for a new approach in the provision of temporary social workers.