|
Memorandum by Jenny Martin, Head of the Leys Children's Centre
Summary: This submission
has been put together by Jenny Martin, Head of The Leys Children's Centre in
1. How models have developed as the programme spreads a. The Leys Children's Centre (LCC) began as a small (£90k ) project in 2004 focussed on outreach work with health visitors and a small programme including centre based staff. The aim was to reach isolated families and to build services around their needs. LCC sits geographically alongside Rosehill- Littlemore Children's Centre (which had developed out of an early trailblazer Sure Start local programme). The design and processes of the LCC were significantly influenced by the successes and the challenges experienced by this early programme. In 2004 the LCC was one of 4 Children's Centres in Oxfordshire. As other centres developed across Oxfordshire they responded to local need in various ways. Funding levels and governance structures also influenced the pattern of development. In 2007 funding for two additional Children's Centres became available for children living on the Leys ( a housing estate with 15000 people, 1200 children under 5 ). Funding for the three centres was centralised under the single management structure of The Leys Children's Centre. The LCC works across The Leys. Key partners are the 4 primary schools, the one pre-school, the Leys Health Centre, the Midcounties co-operative childcare centre and local charities including PEEP, Homestart and the Dovecote Centre. In 2008/9 the focus of LCC shifted from a mostly targeted service to include more universal elements
2. Range and effectiveness of services a. Outreach. A team of 2.5 staff works closely with the Health Visitors to respond to referrals and home visit isolated families who often have complex needs. The LCC Lead health visitor leads the outreach team, provides clinical supervision and oversees the referral process. Health Visitors from across the city also refer and there are many reports about the value of this outreach team. "The outreach team enable us Health Visitors to carry out our primary function of seeing all young families. Before we had outreach staff we spent most of our time involved with families with complex needs. Now we work in partnership. Outreach staff are able to visit vulnerable families- often for extended periods, build trust and coax vulnerable parents into centre based services, parenting programmes, childcare provision, etc. In addition, we are currently short staffed as we have been unable to fill a vacancy- there were no applicants for the post ! ".Approximately 50 families per year receive outreach support ( parents frequently report feeling depressed, often as a result of domestic violence). The impact of the work is that families become less isolated, their depression starts to lift as they are effectively linked in with local services- they start really using the stay and play sessions, access the speech and language service or the parenting support. b. Speech and Language Therapist ( part time )- runs evidence based language groups in the 4 schools for young children. The Speech and Language Therapist (S<) also liases closely with the outreach team and provides training for the whole team and partner organisations on the role of the adult in promoting children's language development. She also runs' Talk -Away 'programmes for parents and children together to promote strong language models at home. This year she has promoted a strong focus on encouraging all families to 'talk with your baby'. All of this early intervention provides opportunities to foster language stimulation.
c. Inclusion and Access Worker (part time)- works closely with the Oxfordshire County Council Early Years Inclusion Teachers to home visit and support families of disabled children. She has successfully included such families into the stay and play sessions and she runs an inclusive play scheme over the summer which draws in children with an extensive range of disabilities. A mother recently commented " ...he is doing really well now and he has just started at an integrated school. Everyone has worked really well together and I've had lots of support, including the family residential, the summer play scheme, support for me, some help with childcare. The joining up has really worked ! "
d. Children's Centre Teacher-is based with the Midcounties Co-operative Childcare Centre who provide most of the childcare for the LCC ( a 72 place centre ). The teacher works in the room with the daycare staff and alongside the manager to institute quality measures ( such as Ecers and Iters) staff meetings, training opportunities and peer mentoring. Effectiveness: when she began with the centre, Ofsted had rated the centre overall as good with a number of areas rated as satisfactory. The recent Ofsted ( July 2009 )found the centre to be outstanding in all 12 measures. Moreover, due to support via the Help with Childcare Fund ( funds vulnerable families for part time places for 6 months)and effective outreach work, the Centre has had over 85 % occupancy for the last 2 years. Last week a brand new centre opened on The Leys, fully funded by the Midcounties Co-operative.
e. Parent Worker- co-ordinates all provision for parents including reviews of courses and training/ supervision of group leaders. Parents hear about effective strategies which help them to understand their children's difficult behaviours and they gain support from other parents.
3. Funding, sustainability and value for money a. The estate is large and contained .All of the area is deprived - significant areas are within the 10% and 20 % most deprived and all within the 30 % most deprived. Families with complex needs can consume huge amounts of an individual's time and 'burn out 'and low morale can result, along with very poor outcomes for vulnerable children. A range of specialist services have been introduced by the LCC and along with the new Common Assessment Framework (CAF) and Team Around the Child (TAC) provision is well co-ordinated. A locality social worker enables any staff member to talk through any child protection concerns. While there is still more work to be done, systems are safer, staff are well trained and stable and morale is good. Children's Centre funding is effectively reducing the negative and costly processes which were associated with 'silos ': when individual professionals struggled under burdens of impossible case loads and departments didn't speak to each other.
b. There are a range of 'pathways' into service provision for families, giving choice and alternatives. This provides value for money because it enables families to access services at a time and a place which meets their needs. Families are more likely to engage in change when they have some control and are actively encouraged to be partners. For example, a family may firstly visit the midwife at the LCC on day 5 of the new baby's life. They may take up the (new) universal offer of a 6 week baby massage class. They may drop in to a stay and play session or be referred by their health visitor or midwife for more intensive support. A father may come along with his children or for a contact visit to a Dad's Zone on a Saturday. Families can access centres for day to day enjoyment (somewhere to go for different play activities) or when they are in crisis. Teachers are seeing more children beginning school who have had social experiences outside the home ( NB The EPPE study found this to be a significant factor in promoting good outcomes). When services were not joined up and families had to go from one service provider to another, many became 'lost ' to the system or extremely de-moralised along the way. School based Special Educational Needs Co-ordinators for example tell us that when families have been involved with the Children's Centre, they are more likely to engage positively with the school - which has huge implications for children's outcomes. While there are still times when families don't attend when they are expected to, they frequently turn up for some other service and so again and again we are seeing effective intervention actually happening, over a sustained period of time.
c. Much of the provision is 'open access', and there is additional specialist support for more vulnerable families. In an open access session we see a real variety of families. There are mothers with experience of post natal depression, children and mothers with trauma from domestic violence, whole families with borderline child protection concerns and often, families who are simply lonely through being newly arrived on a big and seemingly scary estate. Frequently, families experiencing these difficulties do not have any extended family support and so the opportunity to meet with other families is invaluable and effective in reducing their isolation.When parents come along to these sessions, they find a sense of community, playmates for their children and perhaps a friend or other who has been through similar experiences. They will be offered opportunities to further their own learning or personal development and perhaps specialist intervention(eg through a lead professional or key worker. We see vulnerable children be-friending or at least playing alongside more confident well socialised children. Again, we know from EPPE that these experiences can really begin to break (costly) cycles of deprivation.
d. Our Centre offers work -experience opportunities to parents who have been service users, through volunteering. Volunteers are assessed, CRB checked, given initial training, offered work experience opportunities, on -going training and then active help to move into the labour market. We have many case studies of parents who have moved from being initially passive, dependant recipients of the 'service system' to more independent, active participants in their own lives. For example: a sole parent who was pregnant at 15, had never worked and now ( 8 years on ), is studying to be a social worker. Other low income parents who are now actively looking for work / seeking training opportunities after significant personal crises. Vulnerable parents with very limited employment experience, now working in the Children's Centre who are often enthusiastic to mentor other parents. We also provide valuable work experience opportunities for students in professional courses, including social work, youth and community work, childcare and for school based work experience and social care apprenticeships. This again adds value in terms of workforce development. We give priority to students from the local community and we are seeing a growing trend in parents coming forward to take up training opportunities. When we started out, people often commented that on The Leys ( a community where 40 % of adults lack basic skills )" people are not interested in training". Adult learning courses were non existent on the Leys. Stimulated by our partnership ethos and our 'can do' approach, there are now a range of training opportunities and there is now shortage of parents very keen to find places. LCC does not duplicate service provision. We partner with mainstream providers and enable effective and sustainable outcomes - for parents and for children.
4. Staffing, governance , management and strategic planning a. The LCC has a staff of 22 workers, most of whom work part time. Disciplines represented within the workforce include : social work, health visiting, early years teaching, special educational needs teaching, childcare, parenting work and family support, mental health, maternal health, speech and language, community work and programme administration At monthly whole team meetings staff and partners from Health, Schools and local voluntary groups share information and discuss operational issues. There is an emerging parent forum arising out of the volunteer group- who have provided input on most LCC decisions both within and outside of the Advisory Group. There is a senior management structure which brings together senior school managers from the 4 schools and the lead health visitor. This group helps to join up the work and makes both operational and strategic decisions. The Advisory Group has representation from parents, school governors, the local county and city councillor and voluntary groups. This Group provided the initial steer for the whole project and now plays a role of 'critical friend'. The Oxfordshire County Council provides effective and supportive line management and training opportunities as well as a robust self evaluation process (annual) - all of which support effective strategic planning. The Head of the Centre has completed the National Professional Leadership qualification (NPQICL) as has the manager of Cuddeson Corner (the largest Children's Centre site ).
5. Partnership work a. As outlined above, there are strong and effective partnerships with Health. Partnership work with schools is developing - with strong effective link workers and Children's Centre leads in each of the 4 schools who are active and enthusiastic supporters of Children's Centre work. We are also working effectively with midwifery - though we know that midwives have limited time for any additional service provision.
6. Access by those most in need/ access for the most vulnerable. a. The broad agenda of the LCC enables a range of opportunities for working with vulnerable and high need families. The strong and effective protocols which exist between health visiting and the outreach team means that vulnerable families are effectively referred. The number of broken appointments has significantly reduced. Professional networks are strong and vulnerable families who are not effectively accessing services are identified and plans put in place for engaging with them. For example : Health Visitor and outreach worker will do a joint visit, help with childcare fees can be offered to enable families to access services, low key baby massage classes are now routinely offered to all new parents. The discrete opportunity for fathers to engage with services has been really boosted this year by the appointment of a Dads worker and partnership work across the county promoted by the Oxfordshire Parenting Forum. Families with very young babies can now meet midwives at the LCC- and a maternity outreach worker can follow up broken appointments A further example of the broad agenda which always draws in new families - is the focus on the outdoors, including bus trips for families off the estate.
b. The mix of specialist targeted services which link closely and effectively with universal services is a particular strength of the LCC. The very new universal baby massage courses illustrate how this works. The nursery nurse based at the Leys Health Centre actively recruits mothers of 6 week old babies to a baby massage course. The sessions are run jointly by the nursery nurse with a therapist funded by the LCC. If families present as vulnerable or are indicated as vulnerable they will be offered specialist support (individual counselling).Children who appear delayed developmentally are actively referred to the speech and language therapist who can see them at her drop -in session at the local stay and play. In addition, families with disabled children now feel very welcome to attend centres. The carefully structured de-breifing at the end of the stay and play enables staff to discuss any concerns and to explore follow up - for example home visits or consultations with a social worker or other specialist worker.
c. The
LCC is a learning organisation which values the rich mix of multi-disciplinary staff,
partners and volunteers. There are consistent opportunities to learn from each
other. We have undertaken our own research (2009 evaluation of outreach); we
also have research students from
October 2009 |