CYPP Newsletter - Edition 12
Children and Young People's Strategic Partnership
Newsletter: Edition 12 (Autumn 2007)
Download a Copy of the Newsletter 340.83 KB 
In this edition:
- Mums the word on sex education scheme
- Summer School for Talented Performers
- Helping staff to use the integrated processes
- Beat Those Blues
- Care Closer to Home for children. GP pilot
- Groundwork Tameside’s youth programme wins green lottery funding
- Tameside’s Youth Offending Team (YOT) goes from strength to strength
Board News -
Mums the word on sex education scheme
Teenage mums have been giving their views on an innovative school sex education project.
A group of young mothers took part in a peer education scheme in secondary schools across Tameside to give pupils a first-hand insight into teenage pregnancy.
They have since met members of Tameside Council’s Services for Children and Young People Scrutiny Panel, who first recommended the scheme to go ahead, and Cllr Allison Gwynne, executive member for children and young people, to give feedback on their involvement.
The group, who have visited schools over the past year, talked about their experiences of the project and how they felt they were received by pupils as well as gave their thoughts regarding the training and support their received and how they may have personally benefited.
The panel members and Cllr Gwynne also met with this year’s new group of peer educators who are currently training to go into schools.
Cllr Brenda Warrington, who represented the scrutiny panel at the meeting, said: “Young people often find it more helpful to talk to people of their own age or slightly older about sex and relationships; peer educators provide a unique source of information and advice which young people are able to relate to. The scheme also provides important personal development opportunities for the peer educators.
“The Scrutiny Panel was keen to hear about the experiences and views of the young people who have participated in the project. I would like to thank them for taking the time to provide their feedback and help ensure the continued development and success of the scheme.”
Peer Education was initiated by staff at Tameside Connexions, who worked with Brook from Oldham and Off The Record to develop this programme, and was given the full support of the Teenage Pregnancy Partnership Board. This is a good example of multi-agency working as it also incorporates other agencies and service such as Housing and Children Centres.
Summer School for Talented Performers
An annual event took place in the Astley Sports College Sports Hall. It is part of the Tameside Talent identification and development strategy and is attended by Year 5 and 6 pupils from Tameside primary schools that have been identified as having exceptional talent.
The children participate in ten half-day coaching sessions, each in a different sporting activity and delivered by specialist coaches. Every effort is made to present a variety of activities which will challenge the all round abilities of the children. Sports included this year are rugby, hockey, badminton, athletics, gymnastics, judo, basketball, tennis, athletics and football.
In addition to developing the all round skills of the participants the aim of the week is to foster a good attitude towards practice and participation so that they have a better understanding of the personal attributes needed to be successful sports players.
Hopefully, through that week, most of the children were guided towards new challenging opportunities in their chosen sports, and might even have been attracted by the new sports they experience for the first time. All children were encouraged to join local sports clubs and be tracked by club coaches to reach their best sporting potential.
Helping staff to use the integrated processes
Some of the issues of implementation and operational use of common processes (JASPER, Common Assessment framework (CAF) and Lead Professional) are to be helped by Area Coordinators and CAF trainers delivering practitioner workshops in the autumn around the use of Common Assessment and the shared use of common systems of planning for children.
A Common Process Flowchart links three models - our own children’s needs framework, the Department for Schools and Families ( DCSF) lead professional diagram and the process flowchart in one. It will aid conversations and dialogue between practitioners about need and responses in individual cases.
A joint launch of the Children’s Needs Framework and the new Safeguarding Framework procedures took place in the first week in October, which communicated the common processes to huge numbers of staff.
Meanwhile a survey of the perceptions of frontline staff is due to be undertaken in the autumn through the Audit Commission which should provide us with some additional knowledge on practitioners’ views and perceptions on the implementation of common processes. Survey to ascertain the views of frontline staff on the change for children implementation of the Every Child Matters policy agenda, especially in relation to common processes such as JASPER, CAF the Lead Professional etc. Please find attached the web link to the frontline staff survey being conducted by the Audit Commission.
http://www.audit-commission.gov.uk 
Please could you forward to your team the attached web link and flyer and ask any of your staff who work with anything related to 0-19 years provision to fill in the on- line survey. It only takes a few minutes and is easy to fill in.
We will benefit from knowing just how embedded these processes are in Children and Young People’s services across Tameside and can set a baseline form this survey as to where we may need to make improvements.
The survey will run from 26th November 2007 with the deadline of 7th December 2007 for providing responses ‘on line’. If you require any further information or assistance please do not hesitate to get in touch with Ameena Ahmed on tel; 342 3254 or Send a Message to Ameena Ahmed.
Beat Those Blues
The winner of the Tameside and Glossop Primary Care Trust People Pursuing Excellence Awards 2007 is the Out Of The Blues Group who are offering a new six-week course that helps women suffering from postnatal depression in the Tameside and Glossop.
This came about following discussions between health visitors and primary care mental health workers who felt there was a need to set up such a programme following the number of women suffering from postnatal depression in the local area.
Laura Platt a (Primary Care Mental Health Worker) and Anna Wardle (Health Visitor) both found they had a particular interest in the subject and a support programme has been developed that incorporates interventions that would be offered by both the Health Visiting and Primary Care Mental Health Teams.
The first group was held in February, which coincided with the publication of the NICE guidelines on antenatal and postnatal mental health. There has also been a recent increase in the amount of media coverage on postnatal depression. Previously it was thought that between 10-15% of women experience postnatal depression.
However, recent findings from a survey carried out by Netmums. com show that up to 52% of women exhibit symptoms of postnatal depression, thus highlighting the increased need to focus service provision on this area.
Laura and Anna are co-facilitators of the group, bringing specialist knowledge of postnatal care for mother and baby, and the effects of depression on mother, family and friends. The women are invited to bring their babies with them and a crèche is available for other children.
A group participant said, “ It was so nice to talk freely and listen to other people. It made me realise I was ill not horrible.”
Following the initial pilot in Stalybridge the course has now been opened up across the trust. There has also been interest from other Trusts who are interested in finding out more about the group programme, how effective it is and how to gain access to the materials.
If anyone would like further information on this exciting new service provision, or wishes to make a referral to the group please contact.
Laura Platt - Primary Care Mental Health Worker
Wharfingers House, Manchester Road, Hyde SK14 2BD
Tel 0161 351 3040 Email laura.platt@nhs.net
Anna Wardle - Health Visitor
Stalybridge Clinic, Waterloo Road, Stalybridge SK15 2AU
Tel 0161 303 4900 Email a.wardle@nhs.net
Care Closer to Home for children. GP pilot
In health circles, ‘Care Closer to Home’ has been talked about for some time. It offers the potential for being the catalyst, which truly leads to the design of services around the needs of children and young people by overcoming barriers to seamless care whilst offering the potential for more effective use of resources. One of the requirements for delivering the Care Closer to Home vision is to develop the Children’s Community Nursing Service. By building on existing good practise the plan is to expand the service to include referrals from primary care.
The first phase of this vision commenced in June 2007 and offered an open door referral system to a select number of GPs in the area. By the beginning of September 2007, 8 surgeries had joined the pilot. Following a successful presentation to the GP practice managers, the team are welcoming expressions of interest from all other GP practices to come on board. The pilot phase runs until February 2008. After this date the team hope to be available as a referral option for all GP’s, thereby continuing to reduce the inappropriate use of secondary care services for children. GP’s are able to refer in to the team with a condition specific diagnosis of: -Asthma. Eczema. Constipation. Gastroenteritis. Viral illness.
The team is pleased with the referrals so far and are shown here with Dr E Needham the first GP to refer into the service. The team is looking forward to the improved communication links with their primary care colleagues.
Groundwork Tameside’s youth programme wins green lottery funding
Groundwork Tameside’s Community Space Challenge youth programme in partnership with Tameside Youth Offending Team and Ridgehill Partnership Group has received £85.5K to deliver an environment project aimed at motivating and involving over 7000 young people in making real improvements to their local environment and community spaces.
The project is one of 70 England-wide projects lucky enough to benefit from the £8.3 million funding granted from the Big Lottery Fund’s Changing Spaces programme to national charity Crime Concern. The five year Community Space Challenge scheme focuses on re-engaging young people with their local communities and supporting struggling pupils by giving them an opportunity to get involved in making decisions about the needs of their local environment and a chance to pick up qualifications for the environmental work that they undertake as well as giving them a sense of pride in their community.
Activities at Community Space Challenge youth programme will include (young people being involved in consultations with the local community and partnership organisations to identify environmental improvement projects. Activities will be identified by the need of the community, which may include wasteland regeneration, allotment developments graffiti removal, litter clean-ups, park improvements and art installations).
Ross McLarnon, project manager, Community Space Challenge youth programme: “This gives these young people a golden opportunity to receive qualifications for making a positive contribution to their environment and community. This can be used to improve their long term employment opportunities, increase their self-esteem/ confidence and in turn improve perceptions of young people in the community and their views of the older generation.”
Crime Concern’s partners - Encams, The Prince’s Trust, Youth Justice Board and Changemakers - will provide the young people with education, training and employment progression as part of their work. This will include practical support.
Tameside’s Youth Offending Team (YOT) goes from strength to strength
Tameside’s Youth Offending Team (YOT) carries out work with young people aged under 18 who are at risk of offending and re-offending. The team aims to address the issues behind an individual’s actions and make them aware of their responsibilities and the consequences of offending and re-offending.
Evidence from Tameside YOT indicates that the seriousness and frequency of offending and re-offending are much reduced. Considerable improvement has also been made against national performance indicators set by the Youth Justice Board for the last couple of years. There has been marked improvement in the 15 key performance indicators as well as a high standard of improvement in compliance with National Standards. This places the YOT in the top 50 for compliance out of the 156 YOTs in England and Wales, and second in the whole of Greater Manchester.
It has continued to respond to the challenge for Tameside to reduce the percentage of offenders that re-offend. The Prevention wing of the YOT have exceeded their target given, of reducing first time offending by young people of 5% in its first year of operation by achieving a 15% reduction. This is measured by monitoring a cohort of individuals that offend during October to December in one year to see if they re-offend in the following January to December. The recent improvements in YOT performance noted above are reflected in re-offending rates, which continue to show a downward trend.
Board News -
New from the Children and Young People’s Strategic Partnership
The new 3 year Children’s Plan 2007-10 came to the October meeting of the Children and Young People’s Strategic Partnership. Consultation with children and young people, which happened during the summer weeks, has been put into the Plan.
The Tameside Children’s Workforce Development Strategy, a sub group of the CYPSP, held a successful conference earlier this month. Themes included focus on career progression, training and development opportunities across the local authority. It has launched its new Action Plan 2007/2008, as a companion document to the Children’s Workforce Strategy (2006-2009). We are overseeing the Joint Area Review Action Plan which is focussed upon a number of areas where improvements are required on a cross cutting basis in relation to the organisation and delivery of children’s services across the Partnership.
A recent launch of the common processes such as JASPER and Common Assessment Framework has meant that over 2000 staff from the children’s workforce have been prepared for the official start date of the new frameworks to meet children’s needs and safeguarding. We have agreed an Audit Commission Survey to determine progress in the use of common processes such as Jasper, CAF and the Lead Professional and are to be conducted with similar numbers of staff at the end of November.
A National Support Team for teenage pregnancy has reported back to us a number of recommendations and we have created a strategic post with responsibility to reduce teenage pregnancies within the Borough.
The first strategy for services for children with disabilities in Tameside has been produced. It offers a shared unified vision for the development of services over the next three years. It has been developed with active involvement of stakeholders and the children with disabilities Parent Forum.
Our five outcomes Sub-Groups have been meeting regularly and are producing lots of actions and reviews. In particular the ‘Making A Positive Contribution’ theme group prioritised the aim of improving targeted participation by minority ethnic groups in initiating voluntary activities to support the community and environment.
Your Views
Suggestions for future articles in this newsletter are welcome. Please contact Cheryl Eastwood, AED Children’s Services (TMBC), on 0161 342 4143 or Send a Message to Cheryl Eastwood.