contact a family associates...20/01/2015 page 1 of 41 v0.13 strengthening parent carer participation...

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Strengthening Parent Carer Participation

Contact a Family Associates Patricia Branson

Patricia is highly motivated, enthusiastic person who is passionate about equality, fairness and the rights for individuals to reach their fullest potential. She is experienced, creative and innovative change manager with 22 years of experience of working in a local authority, providing care to vulnerable adults and working with staff, service users, families, carers, parents and partner agencies to modernise and continually improve service provision, measuring and auditing outcomes and standards.

Patricia has been a self-employed social care consultant since August 2011, has been solution focussed, has experience of managing and resolving conflict and leads on policy and strategy. Patricia has undertaken several research projects, most recently she has researched the national and local issues for parent / carers gaining and staying in meaningful employment. Patricia has also been commissioned to design and set up a new personalised employment service, this programme has been developed specifically to meet the needs of people with disabilities. It offers a unique approach to supporting people with disabilities into training and work.

In July 2009 Leicestershire hosted the Special Olympics. Patricia proudly took part in this great sporting event. As the Director of Families, she worked with the business, voluntary, and independent sector to ensure the event was memorable and enjoyable for the 2000 family members who visited the city during the 7 days of the games. She reported to the Board of Trustees and followed the governance structure of the charitable organisation, including

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Patricia Branson continued

financial compliance and the need for trustees to operate within the agreed aims and objectives. It was essential for Patricia to work closely with people with learning disabilities

and their families to ensure it was a success. With only 18 months to the games she was able to articulate passionately the visions, aims and values of the charity to raise awareness and raise funds for the event.

Patricia is a trustee on the board a local charitable organisation “The Carers Centre”, the charity that supports individuals and groups with information, advise, guidance and advocacy.

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Carrie Britton Carrie is committed to enabling children and young people with additional needs, their siblings and their parents to all flourish. She is particularly interested in building constructive participation and effective partnership working at all levels, enabling service providers and users together find solutions that make a difference for the families, and which achieves best outcomes for all. For the past twenty five years she has worked as a specialist independent adviser at regional and national level for a range of commissioners. In a complex arena, being able to combine her clinical and research insights with personal experience as a parent carer has enabled Carrie to support different groups of people co-produce creative solutions and strategies together that work and last.

She is one of the original members of National Network of Parent Carer Forums (NNPCF), which brings together 151 pan disability forums across England. She was regional representative for the South East for three years and Co Chair, and member of the National Advisory Group and other national groups particularly related to the Children and Families Bill and SEND reforms. Carrie also supports the South East Seven (SE7) National Champion Pathfinder as the Parent Carer Participation Adviser, particularly developing co-production. Carrie initially qualified and worked as an Occupational Therapist in the NHS, in a range of hospital and community settings. Carrie brought to these roles her strategic and reflexive thinking, policy development and positive governance, diplomacy and solution focussed approach.

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Carrie Britton continued

In 1992, life changed direction when her eldest daughter, aged two, developed a severe form of systemic idiopathic juvenile arthritis. In 1994 Carrie joined the Network for Parents, and was one of a group of parents who set up Amaze. This is a well respected, pioneering, and parent led, umbrella organisation for parents of children with any special need in Brighton & Hove (www.amazebrighton.org.uk).. Carrie completed her doctoral research at the University of Brighton and the Hospital for Sick Children, Great Ormond Street, London in 2002. This explored the evidence base about the families’ experiences. Building on and disseminating this research internationally, she set up CHOICES (Choices for Families of Children with Arthritis), an award winning specialist parent support charity. Using the research evidence and working with Kim Aumann, Carrie also developed approaches to build family resilience, including the ‘Insiders Guide’ parent support courses. She set up the Parent Carers’ Council in Brighton & Hove in 2008, and written a wider variety of articles and publications.

For the last fifteen years she has worked with families, pan disability forums and regional groups and a wide range of statutory and voluntary organisations across England, and is committed to encouraging the next generation of parents to get involved, get equipped, and make a difference. She continues to work as an independent consultant and facilitator in order to improve the experiences and outcomes for families of children with additional needs, and to reform the design, delivery and standards of services they need.

http://www.amazebrighton.org.uk/

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Katie Clarke I am the Co-founder and Chair of the award winning Charity 1Voice – Communicating Together since 1998. 1Voice support families with disabled young people who use alternative communication aids. 1Voice now has 7 branches across the country and brings together families to network, share ideas and information through events and activities. 1Voice has one part time member of staff and has a large team of volunteers and disabled adult role models who support the branches and events. 1Voice has also had a strong national strategic voice through its work with campaigns to support people who use AAC in partnership with Scope and the Communication Trust. I am also the founder of Calderdale Parent and Carers Council and worked to develop the organisation as a paid member of staff since 2001. The Parent Council has been instrumental in shaping parent participation around the country and has developed innovative ways of working and engaging with families. I have developed and led many projects that have been recognised at national level as good practice. I was the Yorkshire and Humber representative on the National Network of Parent Carer Forum Task Group in 2010-2011. Over many years I have trained both parents and professionals and designed courses based on the social model of disability and person centred thinking. I have also worked over the last 7 years to establish other parent forums around the country offering training and development work to forums. I am an “inspirational and motivational” key note speaker and regularly run workshops and seminars at national conferences. I have worked strategically locally, regionally and nationally on various issues relating to families with disabled children and offer a creative and innovative way to working with families. I have sat on many Boards in Calderdale over the years and have also worked on

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Katie Clarke continued Partnership Boards across Yorkshire and Humber. My favourite job is being the proud mother of 6 children aged between 20 and 12 years old! One of my children has complex needs and she is now 19 years old. She has gone through mainstream school despite us being told when she was 3 years old that she had “severe cognitive difficulties and would never be able to attend a mainstream school”. We moved for inclusion from Northumberland to Calderdale and now she is at local college with plans to go to university. I have always been very positive about her impairment and have worked hard to give her and her siblings opportunities to achieve their aspirations and dreams. Many of the projects I have worked on have won awards for outstanding practice. I am an Honorary Fellow of the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists.

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Maureen Crank MBE I have over the last ten years worked on a number of national change management programs on behalf of central government beginning with the Adoption and Permanence Task Force in 2000, finishing in March 2011 when together for Disabled Children ended. I have a professional qualification in Social Work, a diploma in Management and am a graduate from the Common Purpose Program. My career started as a nurse until I later became a social worker, a social work manager and then ultimately the chief executive and founder of a small charity, which under my leadership grew to become a medium sized charity with a turn over of several million and a staff of over three hundred. This involved developing governance arrangements and partnerships with central and local government in a changing environment. After Adoption developed one of the first Family Placement and support schemes for Disabled Children which is still very successful in these challenging times. In the last two years I helped set up two new Charities both working with disabled children and adults whilst last year I visited Bangkok, Thailand, to assist in the setting up of programs designed to help disabled children in the state orphanages join mainstream society. I have excellent knowledge of current practice processes and the required standards of delivery for assessment of SEN and disability, and my work with Together for Disabled Children through both the cluster groups I facilitated and the individual work with local government and Health Authorities has enhanced these capabilities. I saw a variety of different approaches and was involved in helping develop some innovative schemes in both individual areas and across neighboring authorities. One of the last pieces of work I did for Together for Disabled Children was to help the parent forum to become more sustainable.

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Maureen Crank continued I recently helped BBC Children in Need develop their policy for next year in respect of Disabled Children. I have always been interested in parent participation and user designed services and After Adoption was set up by a number of people who had some experience of Adoption. Since the end of Together for Disabled Children I have kept my knowledge up-to-date by reading, following government activity in Disability and keeping in touch regularly with colleagues in Local Authorities. I believe I have excellent analytical skills, I’m able to relate to people in varying settings and bring together groups of people to work together successfully. I would be happy to take on any task you would require of me. I have four sons and six grandchildren .All good fun .

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Carolyn Deveney Carolyn has been an active parent participant over the last decade since she was drawn into volunteering for a SureStart program. This was the catalyst - from then on she became involved with a local Children’s Centre Steering Group, Friends of group, and volunteer, trustee and committee member of a charity who provide support and services for families with disabled children. She played a crucial role in the delivery of an action research project where parents trained as researchers and audited local services. Working in partnership with key professionals, parents redesigned services for disabled children in the borough.

She was also active in her children’s School; national support group for her daughter’s genetic syndrome and helped set up a social group for young people with Asperger’s Syndrome. As a volunteer she line managed a Parent Partnership Service, and is now a School Governor who will be working with the School and parents to develop a parental engagement strategy.

Having first-hand experience of the issues that families with disabled children face and knowledge of the constraints that professionals work within, Carolyn believes that in order for true partnership working to develop, realism and a mutual acknowledgement of each other’s limitations is essential. In ‘true partnership’, workable solutions can be found using the resources available that best meet both families’ and services’ needs. Carolyn is able to build strong and mutually respectful relationships with parent carers and professionals, whilst keeping an open mind and seeing issues from all angles; conflict can usually be avoided by holding calm, rational discussions which get the issues out into the open. From there, realistic solutions can be found.

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Carolyn Deveney continued Carolyn was responsible for coordinating the development of parent carer forums in North West England during the Aiming High for Disabled Children program and has recently been re- recruited as a regional advisor under the new strengthening parent carer participation agenda. Carolyn has organised, administered, facilitated and presented at regional events& workshops for both parents and service providers, and is planning to deliver training in the future. Carolyn also does some Assistant Psychologist work. She was nominated for several volunteer of the year awards and won the Queen’s Award for Voluntary Service with Connect. Areas of expertise:

• Conflict – with partners/internal • Group infrastructure and governance • Group action planning • Dealing with difficult personalities • Skills audit and training plans • Partnership agreements

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Dorothy Duffy After 30 years in the public sector, Dorothy has a strong track record of identifiable success in delivering multiple and complex change and reform programmes across local organisational boundaries in children and family and disabled children’s services. She has worked at the interface between Health, Social Care and Education, as a front line worker, programme and project manager and senior strategic leader. She has considerable skills and experience in developing and delivering innovative and quality services for children with disabilities and their families. As a strategic leader she was key in testing, delivering and successfully implementing national processes locally such as key working, common assessment, information sharing and initiatives such as the Early Support Programme Her drive, commitment and tenacity was highly regarded, in particular for the successful development and implementation of an integrated service for disabled children with a single management structure delivered from a one-stop shop. Consulting with and ensuring effective participation and involvement of parents, children and young people is a key underpinning value of her work with disabled children and their parents /carers. In her role as Local Programme Advisor on the Aiming High for Disabled Children’s (AHDC) Programme, she has worked with parent carer forums in a number of Local Authorities. As a front line worker in the role of specialist health practitioner working with families who have a disabled child, she worked closely with parents and set up a number of parent support groups often in conjunction with the local CAF worker. As programme manager responsible for setting up an integrated co-located service for children with disabilities, she ensured that parents were involved in the set up, design and development of the service from the beginning and that

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Dorothy Duffy continued there was a continual two-way communication. As assistant director she always ensured parents were involved as partners in every respect including, for example, being represented on strategy, management and steering groups as well as procurement panels Summary of areas of expertise • Extensive experience working with disabled children and their families in a variety of roles

as outlined above • Experienced senior leader and strategist working across LAs and Health • Programme and project management delivering multiple and complex change and reform

programmes across local organisational boundaries specifically in children and family, and disabled children’s, services

• Qualified business and executive coach • Able to work across organisational and cultural boundaries • Consultation, partnership working and building productive relationships with key

stakeholders • An in depth knowledge of LAs and their strategic partners, their structures and agendas. • Experienced and confident in working with, and presenting to, multi agency executive and

corporate boards and council scrutiny committees • A key strength is to build and maintain trusting relationships with a wide variety of people,

which is evidenced in the positive relationships built with parents in various roles, despite there having often been a historical discontent and anger over service provision

In 2002 Dorothy was awarded the MBE for services to children with Disabilities.

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Rosalind Grainger Hi. My name is Roz, and I am the mother of a little girl called Esja, born 2006. She has a rare genetic syndrome which causes learning disability, hypotonia, and a raft of other issues. As the person with 24/7 knowledge of what it is like to live with Esja’s complex needs, I feel expertly qualified to participate in decision-making about my daughter. Within the community as a whole, I feel parents and carers have much to offer professionals when it comes to planning and delivering services for disabled children that parents will actually want to use. So I welcome the opportunity to assist other parents and carers to achieve a greater level of participation locally. Although my academic background is law, and I’m to start part-time training as a psychotherapist in October 2012, my day job is ‘freelance writer’. Over the past 15 years, my work has appeared in women’s magazines like Bella, Best, Top Sante, Woman and Slimming World. I usually write health stories, but I’ve also done features, news items, celebrity interviews and book/theatre/film reviews. I’ve also written artists’ statements, funding proposals and done my fair share of editing. In the past three months I have brought together my interest in mental health, journalism and parent participation to launch RE Training, which provides short courses to improve face to face and/or written communication. I was the co-founder of Hackney’s Independent Parent Forum in 2009 and am now its administrator. I would say that my expertise lies chiefly in facilitating forum development from a parent/carer perspective, helping parents, carers and professionals understand one another, explore shared goals and find new methods of working together.

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Gill Greenwood Gill’s background is in adult education and research, then in adult social care commissioning with Sheffield Social Services for 10 years. Her experience there included project management and change; strategy and policy development; supporting partnerships across health, social care and the voluntary sector at frontline, middle and senior manager levels; developing models of participation with community groups, service users and carers; and experience of the political environment.

For 8 years, Gill was Chief Executive of Sheffield Carers Centre - a charity supporting carers of children and adults. Her experience here included charity governance and finance; funding bids and contract management; organisational planning and development; staff and volunteer management; trustee recruitment, training and support; using the press and scrutiny committees. Through the Carers Centre, Gill worked with a group of dedicated parents to successfully manage the early Parent Participation grants and organise the first Parent Conferences; supported parents in multi-agency strategic meetings; and helped develop the Sheffield Parent Carer Forum, which now has over 500 members.

Gill left the Carers Centre in 2010 to work independently. She has provided practical and emotional support to the Sheffield Forum and to a charity for parents of children with Asperger’s syndrome. This has included visioning, business planning, away days, organisational development, policy reviews, charity status, use of the political environment, conflict resolution, supervision and mentoring.

She has two grown-up sons, an elderly mother with disabilities and a brother recently diagnosed with high-functioning autism. She lives in Sheffield and enjoys days out in nearby Derbyshire, watching the sunrise from Mam Tor or exploring the area’s industrial past. She

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Gill Greenwood continued practises reflexology (when friends are willing to donate their feet!), sings four-part harmony songs from around the world in a local community choir, and teaches Natural Voice singing.

Areas of expertise:

• designing and facilitating away days, team-building, training, including training parent trainers

• understanding personality-type preferences • developing effective communication in a range of situations eg conflict prevention and • resolution, handling difficult situations, facilitating meetings • supervision and mentoring for chairs and managers • reviewing organisations’ policies and procedures • supporting and training volunteers • designing consultations • business planning, organisational development, contract compliance • improving inter-agency working

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Anna Gill Anna gave up a career in nursing on the birth of her disabled son who has a complex degenerative metabolic condition, and has been receiving Palliative Care for over 18 years. Anna has always been very active in the voluntary sector; she has been widely involved at a national level in parent participation and policy making since 2004. Previously she was the parent rep on both the Aiming High and Palliative Care Ministerial Implementation Groups and is currently parent rep on the Children & Young People’s Health Outcomes Forum where she co-chairs the Long Term Conditions, Disability and Palliative Care pathway group. She was a founder member of her local Parent Carer Forum in Norfolk and has been the Treasurer since its inception in 2006. Following her role working directly with central Government she was commissioned by the DfE to work as a consultant with Contact a Family to set up the National Network of Parent Carer Forums and after four years stood down from being co-chair in December 2012. She really enjoys supporting other parents to become involved in whatever way and at whatever level they feel comfortable- every little helps! She is a self-employed consultant, and trainer of practitioners and parents of disabled children. Anna was awarded an OBE in June 2012 for services to disabled children and their families. Area of expertise/experience: Particularly within the health arena and partnership working across agencies and hopefully inspiring other parents to have a go too!

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Mary Kuhn

Mary Kuhn brings a wide range of skills and experience to her work with Contact-a-Family. She has extensive experience in education and children’s services - in schools, local government services and national education bodies. She has held a number of national advisory roles performance managing the development of local authority children’s services – in particular services for children with special educational needs and disabilities. Mary was previously Regional Facilitator of the London SEN Regional Partnership where she worked with the 33 London boroughs to reduce inconsistencies in practice and SEN provision. She has also worked in local authorities and government organisations and as an Ofsted inspector.

In her role as Local Programme Adviser with Together for Disabled Children, Mary worked with a number of local areas supporting the development of short breaks for disabled children and young people and the setting up of parent forums. Mary was also an adviser with the National Transition Support Programme working with stakeholders in local areas to improve services for disabled young people preparing for adult life. She brought to both these roles the ability to engage a wide range of stakeholders and to help them to negotiate and put in place plans for service improvement. Supporting the empowerment of parents and the accountability of services have been key themes in Mary’s work with local areas. Mary has trained in coaching techniques and Solution Focused Brief Therapy and she is also an accredited mediator. She draws on elements of all these approaches in her work supporting individuals and organisations.

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Mary Kuhn continued Mary runs a successful consultancy company providing advice and support for strategic development and innovation management as well as training to local authorities, schools and not-for-profit organisations. She also manages the London Disabled Children’s Services

Strategic Managers’ Network which provides a forum in which senior managers in local authorities and health services meet to discuss implementation of national policy developments, exchange best practice and receive peer support for development.

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Sarah Lee I’m a freelance coach, trainer and consultant specialising in working with parent forums, support groups and small voluntary organisations. I have over 15 years experience of working in community development, participation and support work, latterly with Contact a Family and have previously worked with Social Services, Council for Voluntary Service, Age Concern and carers projects.

I have set up a number of parent and community led groups, helped them identify common needs and aims, raise funds and set up legal structures as well as developed parent participation with local authorities. I have also designed and facilitated a range of training courses including parent participation and community leadership. I have a post graduate certificate in personal and business coaching, am a member of the National Council of Psychotherapists and have a Master Practitioner certificate in Neuro Linguistic Programming. I’m also a parent of two children and two step children and have had a caring role with my parents and my daughter. My experience includes: • Coaching and Professional Development for Group and Forum Leaders • Developing parent and community participation within Local Authorities • Facilitating problem solving and action planning with groups and partners • Supporting groups and forums to understand the legal aspects of running groups

including legal structures, governance, funding and policies. • Sustainable group development

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Sarah Lee continued

• Creative conflict resolution • Identifying key issues and barriers to the effective development of participation • Understanding how local authorities work including decision making structures, party and

internal politics and how this can impact on the work of forums. • Fundraising for groups • Designing and carrying out action research projects and consultations.

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Deborah Livingstone I am a parent carer of two young people with complex needs and have worked with parent carers’ groups identifying issues, defining priorities, planning strategies and implementing proposals for more than 20 years. In July 2010 I accepted a part time job to develop parent carer participation in Gloucestershire and by working in a solution focussed manner I have been able to resolve many of the conflicts which had arisen between parents and practioners in Social Care, Health & Education. Through involvement and partnership working I have enabled parents of disabled children to be actively engaged in strategic decision making, planning, commissioning and delivery of services on a local, regional and county level. Membership of the Parent Carer network has increased by over 500% since I came into post and parent carer participation is now seen not only as central to service provision but also as mutually beneficial to service providers and service users. Due to the successes, in March 2011, the local authority awarded a grant for Parent Carer Participation of £35,000 p.a. having stated eight months earlier that it would never fund such work. There are now over 625 families who are actively involved in parent carer participation in Gloucestershire. I have more than 30 years experience of volunteer group development; establishing good practice and building capacity in a variety of settings with diverse needs, including the East End of London, Westminster, Edinburgh, Lancashire, Southern Africa (Lesotho, Swaziland & Botswana) and in the Caribbean. I am an active anti-apartheid worker and have been involved in writing several publications

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Deborah Livingstone continued Strengths I am passionate about the transformational changes that can occur when parent carers are central to policy making, design, delivery and evaluation of services. Trained & experienced in solution focussed practices offering specialised, objective advice and support to parent carer groups with a willingness to travel throughout the UK. I have excellent communication skills across a wide range of abilities and in multicultural settings specialising in involving those people who are often thought of as “hard to reach”. I am skilled in conflict resolution plus managing and de-escalating challenging behaviour through my role as an Independent Advocate and Counsellor. I have a deep understanding about the needs of parent carers and their families. Qualifications include Certificates in Facilitating & Coaching Skills; Advocacy; Neuro Linguistic Programming; Effective Communication; Counselling Skills; Counselling Theory; The Art of Negotiation; Public Speaking and an MA (Joint Honours) in Social Administration and Sociology.

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Simon Nurser As a Dad of three children two of whom have very different additional needs I have first-hand experience over many years of interaction with professionals and have a clear understanding of how it feels when this is done well and not so well. I am passionate about parent participation and believe that parent forums have the potential to make profound and permanent changes to the way families who have a child with a disability are regarded and live their lives. However it is not an easy process to set up an effective parent forum and there can be many barriers and hurdles along the way but the rewards are so worthwhile. The hearts and minds of professionals can be changed and the understanding of both parent/carers and professionals of their respective worlds improved beyond measure. My first career was in commercial banking and working freelance over the last 5 years I continue to work with businesses, helping them to improve the way they work and become more successful. I have had an involvement in the 3rd sector and helping people for 25 years volunteering for a wide range of organisations most often utilising my business and financial skills. More recently I created and led a volunteer prison visitor organisation and I am currently Chair of Peterborough Area Down’s syndrome Group. I have had a diverse involvement in parent participation being a board member in a local city forum, co-director of a large county forum and advising other forums. My wide experience of the 3rd sector and hands on experience of parent participation leaves me well placed to offer support to forums in particular in the following areas:-

• Legal structure, organisation, policy and Governance • Team building, mentoring and facilitation

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Simon Nurser continued

• Financial arrangements including grant applications and reporting • Planning and sustainability • Effective parent involvement and consultation • Partnership working with professionals • Above all to help forums with practical aspects of the day to day, motivating and

inspiring members to overcome those barriers and hurdles

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Ben Palmer

Benjamin Palmer has recently joined the team of Parent Carer Participation Associates with Contact a Family. The role involves providing objective, tailored advice and support to parent carer forums, or partners that they work with, including local authorities and health service providers.

Benjamin Palmer has significant experience of project management having led on a broad range of projects within the public and voluntary sectors, and having worked within specific project remits in the private sector.

In addition, he also has a comprehensive understanding of the issues and legislation impacting upon children and young people with Special Educational Needs & Disability (SEND) and their families; existing approaches in relation to Health, Education and Social Care; and the invaluable merits of securing active and meaningful participation of children & young people with Special Educational Needs & Disabilities and their parent & carers in the design and development of systems and services.

Particular strengths include: service mapping, inspections and reviews; user engagement & consultation; policy reviews; system design & development; commissioning, tendering and procurement; business development, capacity building, coaching and mentoring and the development and delivery of bespoke training packages.

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Steve Parker

Steve Parker has over 20 years experience working in local government. He is a qualified social worker and has also worked as a policy officer. He currently works part-time as a Service Manager for Disabled Children's Services in local government. He is in the final stages of a doctorate at Bristol University.

Steve can help with:

• Governance and working in a multi-agency environment e.g. with health, education, the voluntary sector and parents.

• Facilitating meetings. • Helping forums to define their aims and objectives, strategies and action plans. • Helping to record new/abstract ideas and turn them into actions. • Documentary analysis. • Obtaining complex information in focus groups/interviews and writing up findings. • Advise on commissioning and contracting.

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Miranda Parrott Miranda Parrott has worked in the voluntary sector for the past thirty five years, with families, and particularly with families of disabled children, young people and adults. The main part of her working life has been with Contact a Family (CaF) where she was part of the Senior Management Team. She was parent Participation adviser for Yorkshire and Humber for Together for Disabled Children She has long experience in team management, strategic development, project development provision of information and support to parents, group development, and training for parents and carers, staff and volunteers. She believes in supporting the whole family and has a particular interest in Siblings and Sleep Issues Since leaving Contact a Family in 2001, Miranda has been working as a freelance consultant and researcher. She is a Sector Specialist for C4EO. Her independent work includes: a feasibility study on a Centre for Early Intervention (on behalf of Mencap) commissioned by the DfES. Research project and publication on the effects of sleep deprivation in families of disabled children (for the Handsel Trust). Published “Sleep? What’s that?” Cowdell and Parrott 2007. Development of the Key Worker training document (for Care Coordination Network UK), now incorporated into the Early Support Training programme. She has worked for the Family Fund, Sibs, The Encephalitis Society and Ryedale Special Families. She is a trainer for Scope Strengthening Families and Face 2 face.

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Catherine Ratcliffe Catherine Ratcliffe has 37 years experience working in local government. She is a qualified social worker and was a social work team manager prior to moving in to Education. She has led and managed a social work disability team and the school leaver’s assessment team. Her most recent role has been as a Strategic Leader for school attendance and parenting in a Children’s Services Department. In this role she was had responsibility for Education Welfare, Parenting Services and Anti Bullying. She established a Family Intervention project and more recently a Family Recovery Programme. As part of the Local Authority Parenting Strategy she established a task group which focussed on the voice and influence of parents in shaping parenting services. Since retiring in October Catherine has been working with a Local Authority in reshaping it’s family support services so that early help enables families to overcome current difficulties. She believes that if we provide the right help at the right time then families have a tremendous capacity to address their difficulties. Areas of expertise are developing and implementing services, using her counselling skills to resolve conflict and educational issues.

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Jonathan Ralphs Personal profile Confident and effective communicator with excellent facilitation skills. Has the ability to comprehend and analyse complex issues. Has strategic vision. Excels in motivating and empowering. Humanistic value base –person centred. Positive reputations Here are some things people have said they like and admire about Jonathan: “What I admire about Jonathan is his commitment to the job, his enthusiasm and energy and the results he achieves. I also admire his efforts to practise what he preaches!” “Motivated and a motivator - Cares about others - Approachable – Sense of humour - Easy-going - Kind - Approachable - Understanding - Flexible -Laid back - Inspirational” “The passionate self belief in his work” Areas of expertise Group facilitation; action learning set, team building Co-production of strategy or vision with ownership and commitment to an action plan. Positive and productive meetings Transition reviews Graphic recording and facilitation Creative problem solving

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Justin Simon

Justin lives in west London and he is married with two young children. He is a qualified social worker, and he has worked with disabled children and their families throughout his career, spanning almost 30 years.

Justin worked for local authorities as a social worker for 10 years. This included work with children and adults, as well as setting up new services for disabled children and their families. He has worked in a multi-agency environment, working alongside health and voluntary organisation colleagues

As well as working with children and families, Justin is also committed to supporting parents, and he has helped to run and set up groups for parents in various locations. He has worked as an Independent Consultant for a number of voluntary organisations including the Council for Disabled Children, MENCAP, Action for Children, Children’s Hospices UK, ACT (The Association for Children’s Palliative Care), BAAF Adoption and Fostering, The Children’s Trust, and the Children’s Society. While working for the Council for Disabled Children, Justin trained as a mediator.

In 2006 Justin wrote a guide about services for disabled children from black and minority ethnic communities entitled Diversity Matters. This is available from: http://www.councilfordisabledchildren.org.uk/resources/cdcs-resources/diversity-matters Justin has specialised in consulting disabled children and young people about their lives, which has involved meeting children both individually and in groups.

http://www.councilfordisabledchildren.org.uk/resources/cdcs-resources/diversity-matters

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Justin Simon continued

More recently, he has worked in a local authority implementing the Aiming High for Disabled Children strategy. Justin is committed to improving the lives of disabled children, young people, adults and their families.

In summary, Justin has developed expertise in the following areas: • Direct work with children and young people • Multi-agency working • Project management • Parent participation • Service development • Mediation • Consultation and advice • Research • Transition to adulthood • Key working • Early support

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Mrunal Sisodia Mrunal has the privilege of being the chair of the Bedford Borough Parent Carer Forum, a role he has held since May 2013 when the steering committee was set up. Whilst he wasn’t paying attention Mrunal was appointed as chair of the Eastern Region of Parent Carer Forum’s in summer 2014 and has been thoroughly enjoying the role since. Mrunal is self-employed as a strategy consultant working with national charities, local authorities, the NHS, schools and universities in the spheres of children and disability. However, Mrunal’s most important job is being dad to Arun (6) and Meri (4). Arun was born very prematurely. He has cerebral palsy, autism and an insatiable lust for life. Meri is very fortunate in that she has no problems other than testing her poor father’s patience far too often. In his previous life Mrunal worked in the financial sector for 18 years. After leaving Cambridge University in 1992, he joined Coopers and Lybrand (now PWC) and qualified as a chartered accountant. In 1996 he joined Morgan Stanley as a project manager and worked in London and New York. In 2000 he joined Deutsche Bank and worked in strategic change management devising strategy and implementing large technology, offshoring and re-engineering programmes. In 2011 Mrunal kicked the City habit and resigned from Deutsche Bank to spend more time with his family. Despite a couple of wobbles he has not yet fallen off the wagon and been tempted back.

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Nicky Templeton Nicky is an experienced business mentor and people development specialist. With a broad business and development background and over 10 years’ experience in the business education arena, Nicky has designed and delivered business sustainability and development and marketing programmes for a wide variety of organisations and sectors. Her early big-company career in marketing development with The Royal Bank of Scotland and National Australia Bank has been enhanced by the establishment of her own marketing and development consultancy in 1997. Since then, she has worked with a diverse client list including KPMG, Buddies Charity, ISVA, THFC and Staffordshire County Council producing business, funding and marketing development programmes, innovative team and management mentoring. In addition to this Nicky has lectured in business and marketing at a variety of universities and colleges. Nicky is presently on the Board of Trustees at The Lichfield Conduit Trust, an FA Welfare Officer and a Parent Forum Manager for the CVS. Specialties Business planning, scoping, sustainability and development Business structuring and restructuring Business funding, grant finding and application support Business mediation and conflict resolution Team and committee development, resolution, motivation and bonding. Marketing and communication planning Early Years, Education and Sports sustainability and development. Social Enterprise and Co-operative development

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Anna Walker

Having taught for many years I am now an independent trainer and consultant and have been involved in the development of services for disabled children for 18 years. I have 3 teenagers, a husband and a dog! My 18 year old daughter was born with a rare genetic condition which affects her sight, hearing, learning and mobility. I was instrumental in securing specific funding for the development of parent forums through AHDC after meeting with a number of policy makers through the 2006 Comprehensive Spending review when I was fortunate enough to be able to demonstrate to them the positive effect and outcomes of involving parents in service development through the work of the forum I co founded in 2004 with a small group of parents in my own LA, Cornwall. I deliver a range of training with my training partner Jane Jones and have been involved in consultation and project work both locally and on a National level. I have worked across a number of LA’s helping both parents and professionals to consider the importance of parental involvement and develop strong and sustainable mechanisms for participation. I currently sit on the National Network of Parent Carer Forums representing the Southwest and continue to be involved with my own forum representing parent carers on our Transitions Board. I bring to my work a passion and commitment to enabling parent carers to be fully involved in decisions made about their children and families needs and lives and remain convinced that enabling effective and cooperative partnerships between parent carers and decision makers will result in improved outcomes for all.

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Gail Walshe Gail’s experience with parent participation and user involvement comes from her own experiences as a parent carer, being a parent representative with her local forum and within the Palliative Care sector and working for Contact a Family as part of the Strengthening Parent Carer Participation Team since 2009. Gail’ professional experience as a qualified HR professional and as a workforce development consultant for Local Government and an independent trainer have helped her build a wide range of skills to support the development of parent participation both locally and nationally. She is a trained facilitator and enjoys working with groups to overcome internal challenges or simply to refocus their direction. Gail has a wealth of experience working with Parent Carer Forums at different stages of development, she brings with her a distinctive style of support and uses creative group work sessions and strategies to enable forums to move on and progress in their participation work. Gail is currently involved in Co-facilitating workshops across the country on the subject of Co-production. These sessions look at how Parent Carer Forums and their Partners in Local Authorities and Health can equip themselves with tools and tips to work more successfully together. In her role for the Strengthening Parent Carer Participation team Gail has worked with the Department for Education and their Pathfinder programme leads to support the role of Parent Carer Forums in the ongoing work around the Special Educational Needs and Disability (SEND) reforms. Gail has extensive knowledge and understanding of the SEND legislation that is due to be implemented in Sept 2014.

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Barbara Wilson Barbara has been actively supporting user engagement for over 30 years and believes that shaping policy together makes the biggest difference in people’s lives. She is delighted to be a CAF Associate. With her skills and experience she helps to build those critical trusting relationships, whether they are between parents or between parents and paid staff. She is particularly interested in building up confidence levels and increasing knowledge base so that when she stops working everyone can continue developing and going from strength to strength. She is an excellent networker, able to build connections and enjoys being creative, especially in ensuring everyone can join in. It is important to take time out to reflect on what has worked well and what could be done differently to improve next time and not to have to keep starting from scratch. She strongly believes that everyone has something to offer but is also aware of the day to day pressures of being a parent and running forums, co-producing policies and strategies as well as running events, hosting consultation exercises all as part of effective parental participation. She is a good listener having honed her skills in the early part of her career as a social worker in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets where she still lives. Having worked in local government for 17 years she has an understanding of some of the pressures facing officers. Barbara has been freelancing since 1998 and in that time has worked on many different projects across all age groups. She was the founding partner in a small business partnership (direct roots) which specialised in developing partnership working on projects like Healthy Living Centres and Sure Start Children’s Centres. We also worked on a number of projects for older people –such as Patients as Teachers, Healthy Living Strategies and Smiling More Often. Barbara has always had an interest in working alongside carers-including parent carers.

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Barbara Wilson continued She helped two groups of carers in London set up borough wide forums that are still meeting after seven years and more recently trained Carers’ Champions to deliver carer awareness training to front line staff .Two of these were parent carers of disabled children. She describes herself as a facilitator and has delivered a great number of Away Days for groups often focusing on team building, effective communication and strategic planning. She has also helped groups plan and run events. She was a Trustee of a charity in East London for over 10 years that supported children and young people with disabilities lead fulfilling, active lives whilst being fully in control. She championed the development of an employment and training project as young people were often faced with very limited options post 19. She now has a part- time position as a Self Directed Support Coordinator for a London AgeUK enabling older people to employ their own staff if they chose. She also assists a friend with recruiting and managing his team of Personal Assistants. She is currently an independent co-chair with parents of a strategic planning group leading on the SEND reforms in Newham supporting parental participation. In Lambeth she worked on a pilot in 12 GP practices to strengthen Patient Participation Groups. She has also worked with Healthwatch on strategic planning. She believes in being direct, honest and helping everyone to focus on workable solutions. She is compassionate and considers herself to be a true ally.

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Rita Wiseman.

All my working career has been with children, young people and their families either in the voluntary, statutory or private sector. Initially as a practitioner (play worker, key worker, family support worker, counsellor, group worker etc.) and then as a senior manager and director (Family centres, Sure Start, Integrated Children’s services, Early Years, Together for Disabled Children etc.)

Working in partnership by listening to service users and enabling choice as well as empowering positive working relationships between organisations, underpins my practice

Having the privilege of working in Africa to reduce children’s homes and develop community work enabled me to have a better understanding of poverty and its effect on health and family life. Being the parent of a disabled man enables me to understand the tensions and challenges parents face daily.. I have acted as an advocate for children, young people and families and supported their battles often with bureaucratic systems

It has been rewarding to work on the Together for Disabled Children national programme and so encouraging to see the growth in services and the empowerment of parent\carers.

I am committed to parent\carers participation and enthusiastic to continue to support this in any way.

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Karen Wooddissee Mum to two teenagers with very different additional needs, my son has Autistic Spectrum Disorder which was always apparent; my older daughter has a long term disabling chronic health condition which developed much later in her life. We have all learnt to adjust and take new and different paths sometimes they are fun, sometimes not, but life is never boring!

During my earlier career I worked as an adviser to small businesses, helping them to access the help and support that needed especially during their early stages, this led to many years of experience building partnerships between the agencies and organisations that supported them. Following my son’s diagnosis in 1999 I felt compelled to use those skills to help to improve the outcomes for children with disabilities and their families and soon found myself totally immersed in this new world! I have significant and wide ranging Voluntary and “Not for Profit” sector experience at Board, senior management and consultancy levels. Experience in governance and leadership at Board level; motivating, developing and enabling others to meet their aims and objectives. Extensive knowledge and experience of partnership development, multi-agency working, project management and accessing of funding streams.

I am Chair of Norfolk’s Parent Carer Forum – Family Voice and represent the Eastern Region Forums at the National Network of Parent Carer Forums (NNPCF). I represent the NNPCF at the Special Education Consortium (SEC). Over the past twelve years I have been, and continue to be, actively involved in a wide range of local and national charities and multi-agency Project Boards and Steering Groups. I am currently a Trustee for BREAK, a charity providing a diverse range of caring services for both adults and children with a range of special and additional

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Karen Wooddissee continued

needs. Chair of Saffron Housing Trust, which has an excellent reputation for providing specialist housing for tenants with additional needs alongside General Needs residents.

An experienced trainer, I work alongside Anna Gill, we offer the full range of Early Support courses, part of the team commissioned to develop the Workshops for Parents. We are the Early Support Regional Facilitators for the Eastern Region. We also offer a range of Workshops and bespoke training programmes to meet particular needs, especially for parents who just beginning to use their experiences in a representational or training role or are actively involved in running their local Parent Carer Forum. In partnership with Short Breaks Network we have developed and delivered a number of courses specifically to meet the needs of Short Breaks Carers who work with families of disabled children.

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Jacqueline Wye With 40 years experience of working with children, young people and their families, Jacqueline has worn a range of hats over the years. Jacqueline’s first role was as a Nursery Officer working with children in a busy inner London Local Authority. After studying for a Social Work degree, Jacqueline went on to work in and then manage a range of services including child protection, family assessment and support and cross cutting work with disabled children and their families. She is well acquainted with the processes, procedures and politics within Local Authorities. In more recent years Jacqueline has worked as an independent consultant on a number of Government projects that aimed to improve life chances and choices for disabled youngsters and their families including, Aiming High for Disabled Children, Together for Disabled Children and IMPACT (delivering Short Breaks Nationally) where she had regional responsibility for the London Local Authorities. As well as working with us at Contact A Family, she is also currently involved in the Early Support Programme (A DfE SEND Implementation Delivery Partner) and again she has regional responsibility for London. Jacqueline has worked with a number of parents and Parent Forums (most recently working with Greenwich Parents Forum), helping forums build on the excellent work that they do in helping parents across boroughs to find a voice, work constructively with their local authorities and have real influence on service design, direction and delivery, ensuring good outcomes for all children, young people and their families.

Jacqueline is a single parent and lives with her two grown up children in North East London.

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