Report: Corporate Parenting for Young People in Care: Making the difference?
Abstract
Young people in care and care leavers want to know that their corporate parents (the local authority, collectively with other relevant services) will care for them and do their best for them. In this, one of the largest peer research studies, we report if, and how, this is being achieved.
Our research provides an update on corporate parenting from the perspective of policy and senior managers, social workers and leaving care workers, and importantly, of young people themselves.
We trained 36 care leavers as peer researchers, carrying out interviews with 579 young people in and from care in 12 local authorities. This created a competent and enthusiastic team and produced a wealth of information on progress and perspectives incorporate parenting.
Background
In England around 60,000 young people are looked after in the care of their local authorities at any one time. For young people who need to remain in the care system there is a legal duty on local authorities to support them and prepare them for the transition to adulthood. Alongside this statutory framework is the theoretical concept of corporate parenting, founded on the principle that the local authority as a whole has a responsibility to offer the kind of support and opportunities that any good parent would provide for their own child.
Despite the legislative duties to support young people and the theoretical framework of corporate parenting, young people from care tend to have poorer outcomes than their non care peers and are over-represented in indicators of social exclusion; they are more likely to leave school with no qualifications, have contact with the criminal justice system, poorer health, and be vulnerable to homelessness and unemployment. Although some outcomes for young people in and from care have improved, the gap between them and their non-care peers is widening. The research will focus on how corporate parenting is being interpreted and delivered and in what ways it impacts upon the experiences and outcomes of young people in and from care.
Aims
The research will explore how corporate parenting is operating in policy and practice. It will look at experiences and progress for young people in and leaving care from the perspective of young people and those caring for them.
Methods
The study comprises five key elements:
- an annual policy survey across 12 local authorities to explore developments in service provision in line with corporate parenting principles
- an annual snap shot survey of around 300 young people in care across the 12 local authorities together with information gathered from their lead professional
- a case study sample of around 80 young people that will be followed-up over three years to explore experiences and progress
- focus groups with carers, lead professionals and young people
- an annual review of national and local authority statistics on care experienced and other young people.
Data collection will take place in 2011, 2012 and 2013.
The study will employ both qualitative and quantitative methods and will produce a range of outputs including papers and presentations to practitioner and academic audiences.
Peer research
Importantly, young people are central to the research as participants, members of a research reference group and as peer researchers. The peer research approach involves training care-experienced young people from each participating local authority in a range of research skills including sample recruitment, data collection, analysis and dissemination. The training brings together the key elements of both participation work with young people and research interviewing techniques and protocols (developed within NCAS and SPRU). NCAS have considerable experience in supporting young peer researchers in both national and international research on young people in and from care. The corporate parenting study is currently one of the largest UK studies of care experienced youth to use a peer research approach.
Research interns
The study has provided three research internships with Catch22 NCAS, for students from the Department of Social Policy and Social Work (2011, 2012 and 2013). The student interns have successfully graduated and gone on to work within social work and youth practice and research.
Policy and practice aims of the research
The policy and practice aims of the research are to understand more about how local authorities are delivering the principle of corporate parenting for young people in and from care and how corporate parenting impacts on the experiences and progress of these young people. The recommendations arising from the research will be used to inform further policy and practice developments and will inform the further development of training workshops delivered by NCAS to the sector.
