Why?
The ANV AMPLIFY awards aim to champion and recognise the work of children in care councils and care leaver forums. They were held in October 2022 (Amplify – Coram Voice) – the Coventry Young Inspectors were nominated for the ‘Participation award’.
What?
Coventry’s young inspectors programme is all about young people giving their views & opinions about the activities & services they use in their local area. The
work is ‘youth-led’ meaning young people take responsibility for making all major decisions relating to the inspection and adults play a supportive role*.
The young people make recommendations after they have done an ‘inspection’ of the service – their ideas help the services develop their offer and make sure they are meeting the needs of young people. The work was highly commended in the ANV awards with young people judges saying, “Young inspectors are awesome. It is a programme that does amazing work.” & “A fabulous idea and an awesome poster.”
Impact
So far 40 young people (age 8-23) have been trained as young inspectors. Six services have been inspected to date with 3 more are due to take place. The council has described the work as “an excellent way to hear the views of our children.” Young people have found taking part to be ‘fun’, ‘empowering’ & a chance to make new friends. Services are committed to making changes and have developed action plans based on the feedback from young inspectors.
