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Looking After Children: Cohort studies
Department for Children, Schools and Families (previously the Department for Education and Skills, and prior to this the Department of Health).
Local authorities are increasingly required to provide data that demonstrates the effectiveness of their services to looked after children. This study has explored how data gathered in the course of social work interactions with individual children can be used by local authorities at a strategic level.
The original aims of the study were to:
- discover what information agencies need to monitor the effectiveness of services for looked after children, identify where improvements can be made and decide how scarce resources can be better deployed;
- discover how data gathered through the implementation of the Looking After Children materials can be used to address these issues;
- help authorities understand more clearly how children’s experiences while looked after impact on their psychosocial development.
A ‘snapshot study’ of two samples of children looked after by six local authorities was carried out. One of these samples was followed for three years.
Data on needs, the extent to which the service meets those needs and their developmental progress was collected at four time points.
Interviews with a small group were carried out to identify how the experience of being looked after away from home influences psychosocial development.
A benchmarking group, composed of senior staff from the participating authorities, was also set up to provide a forum that allows them to compare information and to share ideas on how outcome data from this study can be used within the inter and intra agency planning process.
- The largest age-group of the looked after children were babies, admitted before their first birthday.
- For 70%, the primary cause of need was a difficulty faced by a parent or caregiver.
- 42% of moves from residential placements in the first year and 21% in the second were the result of disruptions.
- 44% of all moves in the first year and 48% in the second were categorised by social workers as ‘planned transitions’.
- Almost all that had left care by 30.9.99 were aged under five or over 13. Those who left tended to have had more placements than those who stayed.
- Interviews clearly showed how the children’s lives, needs and experiences varied immensely. Only by talking to them can we get a sense of their requirements and how their experiences impact on their futures and identities.
- Instability in terms of moves between households and different schools often began prior to their becoming looked after and continued on leaving.
- The vast majority of looked after young people of the age of criminal responsibility do not offend; 71% of the young people aged ten and over showed no evidence of offending behaviour either before or during the care episode.
- Care does not appear to promote offending behaviour, but the services provided are not always able to succeed in helping young people overcome deep-seated difficulties which they have already begun to display prior to entry.
- A high proportion of children and young people (including those under five years old) show evidence of mental and physical health problems at entry to care that will require intensive support from carers who may require specialist training to meet their needs.
The study continues to be of relevance to policy and practice and has so far been of an influence in the following ways:
- identification of performance indicators relating to Government Objectives for Children’s Services and the Performance Assessment Framework (1997-8);
- The Social Exclusion Unit report on the education of looked after children and the subsequent Children Act 2004 requirement to promote their educational achievements;
- The Green Paper: Youth Matters;
- the development of the Core Information Requirements for Children’s Services (Data Model) (1999-2001) and Information Outputs for Children’s Services;
- empirical findings from the four rounds of data collection have been used by the participating authorities to explore the provision of adult support services that might address some of the difficulties faced by the children’s parents, to examine the use made of short term temporary placements for very young children and to identify reports required to help agencies interpret performance indicators;
- to inform policy concerning the health needs and the education of children looked after and to contribute to the ongoing discussion concerning the development of management information systems in local authorities;
- development of the Integrated Children’s System;
- to inform the debates on how local authorities can better monitor outcomes for children in need, how national performance indicators can be interpreted and how the care and placement stability of looked after children can be improved and lead to better outcomes.
- Sempik, J., Ward, H. and Darker, I. (2008) 'Emotional and behavioural difficulties of children and young people at entry into care.' Clinical Child Psychology and Psychiatry 13, 2, 221-233.
See http://ccp.sagepub.com/content/vol13/issue2/
- Skuse, T. and Ward, H. (Forthcoming 2007) Listening to Children’s Views of Care and Accommodation. London: Jessica Kingsley Publishers.
- Ward, H., Hardy, A. and Munro, E.R. (In preparation) ‘Who moves and why? Placement stability for looked after children’.
- Ward, H., Jones, H., Lynch, M. and Skuse, T. (2002) ‘Issues concerning the health of looked after children.’ Adoption and Fostering 26, 4, 1-11.
- Ward, H. and Skuse, T. (2003) Outcomes for Looked After Children: Children’s Views, the Importance of Listening. An Interim Report to the Department of Health . Loughborough: Centre for Child and Family Research.
- Ward, H., Skuse, T. and Munro, E.R. (2005) ‘The best of times, the worst of times: young people views of care and accommodation.’ Adoption and Fostering 29, 1, 8-17.
Several researchers from CCFR have worked on this project.
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