Children missing education- resource published

SCIE (Social Care Institute for Excellence) has published an information resource on children missing education in England. The resource covers: children especially at risk of missing education; the roles and responsibilities of parents and schools; elective home education; and local authority duties and responsibilities.   Further details are available here > […]

Care leavers get mental health support in pilot programme launched by NYAS

A programme has been launched to combat mental health issues among care leavers and help them find work. The SideBySide programme is run by the National Youth Advocacy Service (NYAS) in response to mental health challenges and loneliness faced by care leavers. Many are “thrust into the adult world before they are ready, facing a […]

Record number of children in care as adoption rates drop

Department for Education (DfE) statistics show 78,150 children were in care on 31 March this year – four per cent more than on the same date in 2018. Some 72 per cent of children were in foster care – 13 per cent of which were with friends or relatives, the figures show. In addition, the […]

Wanting To Care For a Child Over Christmas

Leading up to Christmas, many families will often think what they can do for others or how they can support children who are not able to spend Christmas with their own families. Within the fostering arena, children come into foster care for many different reasons. One of our advisors has written an article about wanting […]

Be Prepared for Christmas

Christmas is nearly upon us and excitement is already in the air! For some children and young people however, Christmas is filled with a sense of anxiety, fear and stress which can often lead to heightened emotions and difficulties in managing their behaviours. To help you prepare for Christmas, one of our advisors has written […]

Failure of Care System: Homelessness Among Care Leavers

An opinion article in the Guardian by journalist Louise Tickle discusses how the care system is failing children, with one in four young care leavers becoming homeless once they turned 18, and 14% sleeping rough.   Further details are available here > […]

Couple Win ‘Race Discrimination’ Adoption Case

A couple who were rejected by their local adoption service because of their Indian heritage have won their legal discrimination battle with Judge Melissa Clarke ruling that the couple had been discriminated against on the grounds of race when Adopt Berkshire turned them away in 2016. The couple who have since adopted a child from […]

Fostering in England 2018-19: Ofsted Statistics

Ofsted has released its latest annual dataset on fostering provision in both local authority and independent fostering services in England for the year ending 31 March 2019. Key figures include: There were 88,370 approved fostering places as at 31 March 2019, an increase of 1.4% on the previous year, but filled places increased at a […]

School exclusions: free resource

Just for Kids Law has launched a School Exclusions Hub, an online resource to provide advice services and community organisations with the information and tools they need to find alternatives to school exclusion, or to challenge an exclusion. The resource includes step-by-step guides with links to relevant statutory guidance and template documents to enable organisations […]