Training

I have been engaged in various aspects of child safeguarding for about thirty years and have provided training in nearly every aspect of the subject during that time. I was Multi-agency Training Coordinator for an ACPC for a while, teaching on all the foundation and second level courses. I teach child safeguarding at undergraduate and postgraduate levels within my University, so continue to train on all the key aspects of child safeguarding. However, at this phase of my career, I tend to concentrate my training activity for LSCBs and Children’s Services Departments on specialist topics which require particular expertise rather than on extended general developmental training. Some of the areas in which I have developed a special interest include: 

·      Understanding and assessing neglect (One day)

My presentations contain a vast array of things I wish I had known when I was a frontline social worker and manager of child protection service, and can include an introduction to the Graded Care Profile tool for assessing parental care.

·     Learning from Serious Case Reviews (One day)

During this training, I share some very powerful messages about recurrent failings in child safeguarding practice. By combining a personal analysis of the biennial government digests of Serious Case Reviews with a data which I have gleaned myself from compiling a couple of dozen serious case reviews and expert witness reports across the country, I am able to deliver important insights, many of which are entirely original. On occasion, I am invited to prepare a tailored event which involves analysing the whole set of recent SCRs within a particular LSCB area and presenting the key lessons to be learned from these, set against the national background This can provide some fascinating insights at both frontline and strategic levels.

·    Producing high quality Serious Case Reviews (From half a day to two days):

Various forms of training for LSCBs, for their SCR panels and for Individual Management Review writers on how to achieve outstanding results, created in the wake of the introduction of Ofsted evaluation. I address the basic Ofsted standards, but also explore what characteristics we require in a report writer, what characteristic the report writers require from their working environment to support their work, and what characteristics are required of the report itself if we are to maximize our learning. Consideration is given to what we can do to make sure these requirements are met. ‘Whole LSCB’ training, involving tailored sessions for the main board, the SCR panel and for the writers of IMRs requires some two days, whereas a main board briefing, encompassing examples drawn from recent local reports can be achieved in half a day.

·    Putting it on paper (One day)

Few of us love case recording and report writing, but they are key elements of child safeguarding practice. My experience of conducting Serious Case Reviews and writing expert reports in negligence cases against social care employers has demonstrated to me how essential it is that we get these right. This has prompted me to develop training covering case recording and report writing in general, as well as specific training for writing reports for the court.