Critical Conversations in Child Protection: A Webinar Series
Critical Conversations in Child Protection: A Webinar Series
The Centre for Child Protection’s ‘Critical Conversations in Child Protection’ is a webinar series aimed at facilitating learning from the latest research, practice knowledge, theory and lived experiences around safeguarding children and young people. It is designed for a multi-disciplinary group of child protection professionals – ranging from health, social care, education, police, fostering, third sector organisations and more – living in the UK and abroad. Speakers will range from members of the Centre for Child Protection’s team, our academic affiliates, our experienced student/alumni populations, and individuals with a variety of lived experiences relevant to understanding child protection matters.
The ‘Critical Conversations in Child Protection’ webinar series is free to attend and will be held virtually via Zoom. Registration prior to attending is required.
2023 Speakers
10 October 2023, 10.00-11.00
Is
it time for a ‘legitimacy turn’ in child protection?
Speaker: Jo Warner
This
session will focus on the concept of legitimacy as applied to the use of power
in statutory work with children and families in the UK. It will draw on
literature from police studies, in which the concept of legitimacy is heavily
researched. Police and state child protection workers such as social workers
bear comparison in respect of legitimacy because of the significant powers they
use on behalf of the state. Their decisions have direct implications for the
civil and human rights of their fellow citizens, and in each case there have
been concerns about disproportionality in the use of their power with
particular groups. Yet, despite these parallels, the concept has received
little explicit attention in child protection. The session will make the case
for a ‘legitimacy turn’ in child protection based on the example of
disproportionality in the use of state power with families living in poverty.
Voluntary
Accommodation Agreements in Child Protection: The Law and Practice of Section
20 Children Act 1989
Speaker: India Hughes
Positioned
between care proceedings and family support work, Section 20 Children Act 1989
(“s20”) allows social workers to accommodate children in local authority care
on agreement with their parents. The provision has clear benefits to both
social work teams and families, but the position of these agreements outside of
the court system leaves room for misuse and misinterpretation. This session
will summarise early findings from a socio-legal study examining the use of s20
in practice while unpicking the ambiguous guidelines from law and policy.
Safeguarding Separated Young Migrants: What difference
might gender make?
Speaker: Dr Rachel Larkin
Each year thousands of children and young people
become separated from family and carers and cross national borders alone. The
reasons for child and youth migration are complex but can include trafficking,
exploitation and high levels of risk for young people. This session will
draw on research with separated girls to explore how young people’s
experiences, and professional responses to young migrants, can be affected by
gender. It will consider how states are responding to young migrants, some of
the challenges this work poses for child protection services and what might
constitute best practice.
Embedding Trauma Informed Approaches in Police Responses to Child Sexual Exploitation: A Collaborative Simulation Design
Speakers: Dr Tracee Green, Dr Aravinda
Kosaraju and Emma Soutar
Funded
by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), a collaboration between the
Centre for Child Protection and Kent Police was created with the aim to tackle
Violence Against Women and Girls – or ‘VAWG’. This project specifically focused
on sexual exploitation of girls through the creation, application, and
evaluation of a trauma-informed pilot-training simulation tool for police. This
session will provide an overview of the project’s history, the reasons for its
focus on a trauma informed approach, and early evaluation results of its
implementation.
What intersectionality and critical race theory offers child protection professionals
Speakers: Vanisha Jassal and Isobel Drew
Ethnic,
racial and cultural disproportionalities continue to exist across UK child
protection practice, services and outcomes for children, young people and their
families. This is known and accepted across agencies and policy sectors and
efforts to address the problem, although evidential, have made limited impact
overall. This session discusses the
importance of integrating relevant theoretical approaches to develop
practitioner skills in adopting a more interrogative approach with the aim of
improving the lived experiences of children, young people and families.
Relationship themes and dynamics between Social
Workers and Parents
This webinar explored PhD findings on
relationship dynamics between parents and social workers from the parents’
perspective. It touched on key research findings from within the field of
social work and psychology to better understand the potential challenges faced
within these relationships.
Standardised Measures; Friend or Foe? Parenting Assessments in Court with a focus on Parenting Assessment Manual Software (PAMS).
Decisions being made within care proceedings can result in potentially life altering outcomes for families whereby children can be separated from their carers and placed for adoption. Judges and magistrates utilising parenting assessments to help make these decisions need to be able to rely on consistently good practices to inform them; however, there are indications that the quality of these assessments can vary. This webinar explored the value of standardised measures informing assessments with a particular focus on findings from a study looking at the perceived value of incorporating Parenting Assessment Manual Software (PAMS) within parenting assessments for court.
Online Child Sexual Exploitation and Abuse:
Dilemmas and Prospects for Child Safeguarding Practitioners
This session examined the nature of Online Child Sexual Exploitation and Abuse (OCSEA), prevalence and challenges confronting child protection practitioners. It looked at the Online Harms Bill 2022 considered by the UK parliament and drew attention to complexity emerging from an intersection of technology, rights, responsibilities, harms and wellbeing of children and young people.
Addressing ethnic inequalities in child
protection practice: Why it’s time we move beyond the research
Ethnic inequalities in UK child protection practice have been documented for many years, negatively impacting the lives of many children and families. This webinar threw a light on current data and research and urge practitioners and organisations to remain sufficiently cognisant about the issue, and the implications for vulnerable children from continuing inequalities.
How child protection simulations create safe
spaces to learn and practise practice
This webinar explored how CCP’s suite of
simulations (serious games) facilitate a unique learning environment to develop
skills in complex child protection landscapes. It demonstrated how
professionals can practice engaging with complex families and why this matters.
It examined how training skilled child protection professionals in the grooming
suite of simulations can increase confidence to tackle difficult issues. It
does this, in part, by providing scaffolding for discussions when engaging in
direct work with children which activates critical analysis.