Targeting Families in Greatest Need of Support Claire Easton Research Manager National Foundation for Educational Research SSRG Conference on Identifying and Working with Families with Complex Needs: Policy, Evaluation and Good Practice July 2 nd 2012
Targeting Families in Greatest Need of Support. Claire Easton Research Manager National Foundation for Educational Research SSRG Conference on Identifying and Working with Families with Complex Needs: Policy, Evaluation and Good Practice July 2 nd 2012. About the research. - PowerPoint PPT Presentation
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Targeting Families in Greatest Need of Support
Claire Easton Research Manager
National Foundation for Educational Research
SSRG Conference on Identifying and Working with Families with Complex Needs:
Policy, Evaluation and Good PracticeJuly 2nd 2012
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About the research
Funded by the Local Government Association (LGA)
To explore the different approaches which LAs and early years settings take to targeting support on the neediest families – through lens of Children’s Centres
A rapid review of policy and research
Case studies of 6 local authority areas: 47 interviews with LA and Children’s Centre staff, seven focus groups with staff from other Centres and services
April to September 2011
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1. Who are Children’s Centres targeting?
Children (e.g. additional needs, speech and language delay, challenging behaviour)
It’s a dynamic system - services need to ‘step down’ as well as ‘step up’
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Staff attitudes are key to understanding barriers ...
‘ There used to be a term “hard to reach”. But we don’t use it any more, because we recognise it’s us who are hard to reach, not the families ...
If you’ve not got any confidence, or you think that they will tell you that you’re a bad parent – if that’s what’s preventing families engaging with us, we’ve got to try to reduce those barriers .’ (Centre manager)
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Who are the ‘most needy’?
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Difficult to define precisely
In practice, focus on children at Levels 4, 3 and 2 (windscreen model)
But this does not include early intervention and ‘hidden needs’
This model focuses on children, not families
What are the consequences for staff of dealing with families at higher levels of need?
Key issues and implications
Identifying families in greatest need is a complex process
Staff are keen to prevent stigmatising
Universal services are key
Language is important (‘supporting families’ rather than ‘targeting needs’)
Some centres face difficulties in getting certain data
Workforce and training implications for data management, evidencing impact and dealing with families with more complex needs
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Further information on Targeting Families in Greatest Need of Support
Published report is available at:http://www.nfer.ac.uk/nfer/publications/LGTC01/
Other NFER publications and resources• LARC http://www.larc-research.org.uk LARC 4 explores the interface
between CAF/TAC model and social care intervention to support children and families with complex high level needs
• Early intervention: informing local practice (Feb 2012) http://www.nfer.ac.uk/publications/LGLC02
• Developing a business case for early interventions and evaluating their value for money (November 2011) http://www.nfer.ac.uk/publications/EITS01
• The experiences of fostering and adoption processes – views of children and young people: literature review and gaps analysis (May 2012) http://www.nfer.ac.uk/publications/LGFR01
• A good practice overview of fostering and adoption activity: case study reports http://www.nfer.ac.uk/publications/LGFP01
• http://www.reason-network.org.uk/ resources, networks and support from research in practice, research in practice with adults, NFER
• Children’s Trust arrangements and Health and Wellbeing Boards following the Health and Social Care Act (to be published)