What is important to children in care and care leavers?

The questions in our surveys were developed with children in care and care leavers, to reflect the things they felt made their lives good.

Children and young people stressed the importance of positive relationships with social workers and leaving care personal advisers (PAs). 

The questions asked about social workers and leaving care personal advisers (PAs) include whether children and young people:

• Have changed social workers or PAs in the past year.
• Know who their social worker or PA is.
• Trust their social worker or PA.
• Find it easy to contact their social worker or PA.

There are also questions that relate to how social workers and PAs work with and support children and young people in the rights & voice section.

How are local authorities supporting children and young people’s relationships with social workers and leaving care PAs?

• Enabling children to know who their social worker is and improve trust (April 2021) St. Helen’s

• Making Christmas special for care leavers (Feb 2021) Coventry

• Making pathway plans relevant to the needs of young people (January 2021) North Yorkshire

• Building trust leaving care workers through a Strength in Relationships practice model (January 2021) North Yorkshire

• Changing the language used by professionals to be more child focused (Jan 2021) North Somerset

• Introductory cards to support children in care to know their social worker (Jan 2021) North Somerset

• Developing a culture of celebrating the success of our care leavers (Oct 2020) Coventry

• Making sure all children know their social worker (Sep 2020) Middlesbrough

• Focus on recruitment and retention to achieve greater stability of social workers (Sep 2020) North Somerset

To read more about what children and young people feel about their lives and their well-being, have a look at our publications and news items.

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