Family engagement and assessment

Learning from the experiences of parents with children in care

Teegan Bain, Felicity Kime and Jessica Cocks

“Acknowledgement of country… We acknowledge the Gadigal people on whose land we meet today. We pay our respects to elders past present and future. We acknowledge the

Gadigal people’s past and present suffering from the policies and practices of the child protection system in Australia.

We also pay our respects to any Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander

people who may be with us today.

1.IntroducingFamilyInclusionStrategiesintheHunter(FISH)2.Whyfamilyinclusionisimportant–nomatterwhatmodelweuse.Howdochildrenbenefit?3.Learningfromparentsandfamily4.Developingstrategiestoimprovepractice

Session outline

1. Family Inclusion Strategies in the Hunter (FISH) – a children’s rights organisation

WorkingwiththeFamilyInclusionNetworkofAustralia

Activity one… why do we need to be better at building relationships in the work we do with children in care?

•  Betweenparentsandtheirchildren

•  Betweenparentsandworkers

•  Betweenparentsandcarers

•  Withandbetweensiblings

•  Etc..

2. Why family inclusion is important

Childrenandyoungpeoplewholeavecarewithintactandpositivefamilyrelationshipshavebetteroutcomes(Mendesetal,2012)

Carerandparentrelationshipscontributepositivelytorestorationandtorelationalpermanency(CWIG,2015,Hojer,2009)

Childrenincareneedandwantongoingrelationshipswiththeirparentsandbenefitfromthese.Earlyattachmentsendureandhelpchildrendevelopandgrow.Childrenneedtobelongtotheirfamilies(Create2014,Biehal,2014Baker,2016)

Siblingrelationshipsareimportantforallchildren,whethertheyareinoroutofcare(Create,2015)

Parentsarejustasabletofocusonchildren'sneedsthanotherstakeholders(Rossetal,2017)

Family inclusion and child safe organisations

RoyalCommissionintoInstitutionalChildSexualAbuseThemorepeopleinvolvedinachild’slife,thesafertheyare.Bystrengtheningfamilyrelationships,bylisteningtoparentandfamilyconcerns,wewillkeepchildrensafer

OneofthechildsafestandardsidentifiedbytheRoyalCommissionisfamilyandcommunityinvolved.

Relational permanency….

“Theweightofevidence,fromallquarters,convincesusthattherelationshipswithpeoplewhocareforandaboutchildrenarethegoldenthreadinchildren’slives,andthatthequalityofachild’srelationshipsisthelensthroughwhichweshouldviewwhatwedoandplantodo(TheCare

Inquiry,2013,p.2).

“Kidsneedtheirparentsintheirlives…onewayortheother”(Parentwithchildrenincare,Newcastle,

2014)

3. Learning from parents

Familyinclusiveorganisationslearnfromthelivedexperienceofparentsandfamily.

4. Strategies to improve practice…

Activity.

At your tables consider how you are going to provide leadership to your teams to build a more family inclusive

approach to…

Assessment, family time together, carer parent relationships, sibling relationships and agency culture.

Strategies to improve practice

Practical support

Relationships with carer and parents

Professional relationships with workers

Relational permanency /focus on relationships, not

contact /reduce supervision

Flexible and informal – not rules and procedures

Acknowledge and mitigate power imbalances.

Supporting and connecting with families

MonthlysupportgroupsintheNewcastleandCentralCoastarea

Afacebookpageandwebsiteforparentsandfamilytogetinformationandsupport:

www.finclusionh.org

Thankyou for attending and thanks to our

supporters.

Questions