« Previous | Contents | Next »
Listen
6 Receiving encouragement and support
Many participants gave us examples of encouragement and support that had helped them become successful. Often, this support was provided by foster carers, residential workers, teachers and social workers but there were others, personal friends and partners, whose support and influence was no less important. Encouragement and support described by the participants included:
- mentoring
- help to understand the past and the present
- belief in the participant's ability
- unwavering commitment to the participant
In childhood and adolescence, the presence of a supportive adult is particularly important. Jack and Gill (2003), for example, report that one of the most protective factors associated with resilient children is 'a reliable and supportive relationship with an adult outside their immediate family' (p.21). Looked after children have as much need of this kind of supportive adult as do other children. The relationship between a child and the professional workers in their lives is extremely important in this respect:
I've always had the support from my social worker. I always listened to her and took her advice and she was always there for me. (Fraser)
Guidance teachers can have a special role with looked after children:
My guidance teacher, I get on really well with her. She gives you help and advice. She's like your best friend in school. It was a big change from my last school and I didn't think I'd be able to do as well as I have. I'm sure I wouldn't have been able to do it without all the support I've got. (Claire)
Through direct work, professional workers can help children understand their experiences. This can support children to develop an optimistic, problem solving approach to challenges, as advocated by Seligman (1995 and 2002). As one participant put it:
The people here have really helped me through a lot of things so I could begin to trust people again because I've been very disappointed in the past. (Alison)
The professional role in supporting and encouraging children needs to be underpinned by a genuine desire to see the child do well. Glenn told us about his social worker, who communicated with him in the way he valued and understood:
My social worker? I really, really like that guy. He's helped me a lot. I feel like he's thrown another lifeline to me. He used to come and see me a lot and that helped. It's like the social worker goes out the window and a father comes in and talks to you and you know that you are going to really get somewhere.
Tara described her social worker's commitment to her in terms of being made to feel she was a person, not a lost cause:
She was an absolute godsend to me. She knew I wasn't an angel, she knew I was bad but she also knew why I was bad. She knew it was attention, also the fact that I was just a teenager. She was an absolute godsend, she saw me through everything. She just took the time.
In other cases, the belief was grounded in the supporter being there when needed and not giving up. Foster carers were important in providing this kind of support and there were many examples of foster carers who had stuck by children, with a tenacious commitment to their welfare, over a long period of time:
Support - support from my carers has been part of it. I keep going on about it, but you have no idea how much they helped me. (Mark)
Support and encouragement when leaving care
Many looked after young people become independent before they reach 18 years (Stein and Carey 1986; Biehal and others 1995). Dixon and Stein's (2000) study of young people leaving care in Scotland found that nearly half of the young people they spoke to felt they had no choice about when they left care. Most other young people leave home much later than this and it is more likely that they will have choice over when they leave. This means that young people who have already experienced greater stresses or difficulties in their lives are having to adjust to adulthood much faster, with less reliable support from families than most young people have. To do this successfully, young people need local authorities to arrange both practical and emotional support from skilled and knowledgeable adults.
The Children (Scotland) Act 1996 gives local authorities duties towards young people who are looked after until they are 18 years old. It also allows local authorities to continue to give young people support, in the form of help and advice, until they are 21 years of age.
Dixon and Stein (2000) suggested that support for young people leaving care is patchy and sometimes difficult to access. Partly in response to this, the Scottish Executive has introduced pathway planning (Scottish Executive, 2004). This is designed to help young people become confident and successful. The guidance and materials can help local authorities assess young people's needs and plan how to meet these effectively. Responsibility for pathway planning extends to all local authority departments and other agencies. The guidance calls this corporate responsibility. Pathway planning is designed to make sure that local authorities, carers and other professionals and services work together to:
- help the young person get the knowledge and skills they need to manage a home
- get education and training for a career
- move on when the time is right
Planning should start well before the young person leaves foster or residential care and young people themselves should have a degree of control over what happens and when. Each local authority now has a lead implementation officer to help them put these new arrangements in place.
Some of the participants had been involved in this way of working. Most, however, left care before pathway planning was introduced in 2004 and their experiences varied.
Participants told us about very different experiences of financial support. Some participants were being financially supported through higher education, sometimes involving a significant amount of funding over a number of years. Financial support for other things seemed harder to obtain.
Kirsty, after leaving care and having a baby, was given a limited sum of money for a deposit on privately rented accommodation. This was the only support of any kind she received after leaving care:
So I got money for my deposit but I think quite reluctantly, they gave it to me. After that I never heard anything else from them. I never, ever felt like I could go back to them.
Theresa talked about her experience of leaving care and contrasted it with the support she now can make available for other young people, in her post as a social worker in a throughcare and aftercare team:
At that time there was the mentality that you left care and you just got on with it. Now, every young person in care in this authority, at 17 they'll have a provisional driving licence, a birth certificate, a bank account. Every young person will have an opportunity to learn a skill or go on to study.
Some participants in the study had been well supported by aftercare teams and told us about the difference this had made:
I got quite a lot of practical help, you know, like they helped with my rent and everything. Now I've got a support worker and she helps me more with emotional support and I know if I picked up the phone and said I really need to speak to someone, she'd be there. I think it's just amazing that five years down the line there's somebody still there for me. (Denise)
In the best examples of support, we found that young people were involved in the planning for their future and were supported to develop the skills they needed. They were also able to make mistakes and be helped to put these mistakes right by their supporters. Young people greatly valued getting the right kinds of financial and practical support that good parents would have provided. Many participants also related their experience of encouragement and support to what they were then able to achieve as young adults.
« Previous | Contents | Next »