Cabinet agrees new Children Looked After strategy and Care Leaver Offer

Today the council's Cabinet approved the new Children Looked After Strategy and Care Leaver Offer. The Strategy and the Care Leaver Offer are intended to ensure all Children Looked After access the opportunities that enable them to realise their aspirations and move into adult life successfully.

Both the Strategy and Care Leaver Offer have been co-designed with Children Looked After and Care Leavers to ensure we are focusing on the issues that matter most to them. A range of partners such as the NHS, DWP and GLL leisure have also contributed to ensure young people can access the same services and activities as other young people across the county.

These documents align with the new Children and Young People’s Plan being developed by the Children’s Trust Board in order to create a collective commitment to improving the outcomes for all Children and Young People across Cumbria.

+ VIEW THE STRATEGY

+ VIEW THE CARE LEAVER OFFER

Our survey said...

In case you missed the results from the recent People Survey, all the findings and feedback from Assistant Directors can be accessed below.

+ VIEW THE REPORT

+ VIEW THE AD FEEDBACK

Secretary of State praises apprenticeships team

The apprenticeship team have had a Christmas boost from the Secretary of State for Apprenticeships and Skills, Anne Milton, who last week wrote to congratulate the team on being  "one of the top performing apprenticeship employers in the country" and praise their  "commitment and enthusiasm for apprenticeships".

Well done!

+ READ THE LETTER

AMHP training approach recognised

UCLan, the Council’s new teaching partner for Approved Mental Health Professionals (AMHP), have been so impressed with the quality of the work done by our AMHP team to develop AMHP Practice Education that the team were invited to put forward a paper for consideration by the International Conference on Social Work in Health and Mental Health.  The Team have now been invited to present their work at the conference - putting Cumbria front and centre on the international stage!

+ FOR MORE INFO CONTACT BECKY.SQUIRES@CUMBRIA.GOV.UK

Celebrating Social Work conference report

This year's Celebrating Social Work conference was attended by 120 people which was fantastic . There was great input from external speakers and colleagues from the directorate.

Dez Holmes from Research in Practice who has spoken previously at our conferences said: “I came to your conference 5 years ago, and it was full of external speakers telling you how great they were. This year I’ve had the privilege of being the only external speaker and I have listened to your own social workers talking about the fantastic work they do every day for the children of Cumbria - you should be very proud”. 

A People Social Work conference is planned for the first half of next year.

+ VIEW THE SLIDES FROM THE CONFERENCE

Regional Adoption Agency in the news

Plans for the new Regional Adoption Agency have made the news this week as interest builds in what it will mean for children and families. Also this week the RAA published its latest stakeholder update newsletter.

Consultation also continues on the name and brand options for the new agency.

+ HAVE YOUR SAY

Focus Family Team supporting project to improve the lives of Children in need

Volunteers for Project Linus North Cumbria have been busy creating hundreds of blankets and quilts for children in need this year. The blankets provide a sense of security, warmth and a comfort to children who are seriously ill, traumatised, or otherwise in need. The Focus Family Team met with the volunteers to share a Christmas lunch and collect dozens more blankets for distribution around the festive period. 

+ FOR MORE INFO CONTACT ANN.FORD@CUMBRIA.GOV.UK

Cath Whalley, Assistant Director Adults visits Pam McCall from the Brokerage Team (Carlisle and Eden) and Sarah Caton from the Community Finance Team (Carlisle, Eden, Allerdale and Copeland).

Cath Whalley

"The shadowing project really brought to life for me the vital work that the Brokerage Team and the Community Finance Teams do, and the challenges that they face on a daily basis, balancing the different responsibilities that they have. It was a great morning, and there was so much to talk about that we quickly ran out of time. I want to thank the team for making me feel so welcome and for talking so openly and honestly with me. During the morning, I asked the teams two questions. 
1. If you could change one thing about your job what would it be?
2. What motivates you to come to work every morning?
In response to the first question, I have taken away ideas and suggestions that I will ensure are fed into plans for developing these vital service areas in the future, which include potential opportunities to improve the systems the team use. What came across loud and clear in relation to the second question was ‘the people’. Everyone in both teams are passionate about doing the best job that they can, and ensuring that vulnerable people have the information, advice, care and support that they need to enable them to live their lives as safely and independently as possible. That was hugely motivating and inspirational for me.”

Colin Cox, Director of Public Health visits Barry Arnison and Abi Reed, Health & Wellbeing Officers

Colin Cox

“It was really good to spend the morning with Barry and Abi from the Early Help and Targeted Youth Support Team. They made me very welcome on a really wet and miserable morning in Workington! It was helpful to see how the team work with young people who are at risk because of drug or alcohol misuse. They talked me through the service, describing how they’ve moved from being mainly focused on picking up referrals of young people who’ve had to attend A&E as a result of using drugs or alcohol to a much wider range of referrals, including from schools, the police, and other parts of the children’s services system as well as some self-referrals. In total in 2017/18 they worked with almost 400 young people, helping educate them and get them thinking differently about drugs and alcohol. I then had the privilege of being able to sit in on a session in which Barry was working with one young person, who’d been referred to the service by his school after some of his friends expressed their concerns about him to a member of staff. It really showed the strength of the approach, with Barry, the school and the parents obviously working well together to support this young man to think differently about his actions. There’s definitely more we can do to make sure that this service is well connected into other parts of the system, such as our Health and Wellbeing Coaches and the integrated public health and early help services for children and families that we’re currently redesigning, and to make sure they’re part of the growing family of strength-based services that the Council runs. So a really positive experience – and many thanks to Barry and Abi for the opportunity to see them in action!”

Barry Arnison

“As a front line team working in early intervention it is important to us to be valued and feel we are making a difference to those young people and families we are working with. It was good to be able to invite a member of the senior management team to spend time with us it gave us the opportunity to discuss our work and more importantly, how we can improve the service. At the end of the session the school head joined us for a chat and described how he feels the service supports the pupils and staff when concerns are raised about risk taking behaviour. Back at base we reflected on the day as being very positive and I was pleased that we had taken the offer of being shadowed."

Dan Barton, Assistant Director Education & Skills visits Jess Morton, Health and Wellbeing Coach

Dan Barton

“We started our shadowing experience in the office at Cumbria House, where I heard about the principles underlying the HAWC service, and the logistics of carrying out the role from day to day. I was struck by the varied nature of the work! From one day to the next (from one HOUR to the next) Jess, and other HAWCs like her, could be working with a victim of domestic violence, supporting someone with agoraphobia , or enabling someone with significant mental health needs to learn how to manage their life.

The key word here is support. From my shadowing experience, I was able to see first-hand  how expertly the  coaching methodology was put into action. The HAWCs in Cumbria are a really successful example of where we have moved away from the “Do For” model of the mid-twentieth century, to the “help to do” model which we hope to espouse today. I was left in awe of Jess’ professionalism, dedication and kindness.

In terms of ‘take-aways’, there are lots.  In particular, through different areas of my services, I am thinking about how best to implement the principles of asset-based and co-production approaches -  the HAWCs are a great model for this, and I will very much bear this in mind as I continue with this work. Thanks again to Jess Morton for putting together a really authentic and impactful shadowing experience for me.”

Jess Morton

“I am beaming with pride today following such lovely feedback and I think it truly reflects on why I do the job I do! It was great to provide Dan with the opportunity to gain insight into just a small part of what we do. I am pleased Dan was able to take away so much information from the session in just a short space of time. One of my personal frustrations is that many professionals out there still don’t truly understand what our job entails. It was really nice to give someone that real life insight into our role and I think we really need to do this more. This will allow more people to see how differently we work and I think other professionals would really benefit from seeing how we implement our strength based, coaching approach.”