Swalwell Primary School has inclusion at its heart. Based in Gateshead, the school is a small mainstream primary school with two specialist provisions. One for children with physical disabilities and a second, more recently established, one for autism. At Swalwell, what makes you different is something to be celebrated and every pupil is encouraged that they have the right to be themselves. This includes the three out of five children eligible for pupil premium and those from families they see managing the difficult grey area between qualifying for support and just missing out; they estimate between 75% and 100% of pupils live in postcodes of above average deprivation. 

Guided by Rachel Hocking, Headteacher, Karen McCall, assistant headteacher and Katie Doyle, Family Support Worker, the school whole heartedly embraces its role as ‘more than just classroom educators’, going above and beyond to support pupils and their families to survive and thrive in this challenging financial climate. Initiatives include running an onsite foodbank; gaining grants on behalf of parents for essentials like ovens and washing machines; a free Breakfast Club that welcomes everyone; and a ‘walking bus’ that helps parents manage work shifts and caring roles, whilst improving attendance. Their attention to detail is also impressive, with touches like giving foodbank users supermarket branded bags putting the experience of those accessing support at the heart of decision-making. 

We spoke to Rachel and Katie about how taking part in a Poverty Proofing® audit had given them new perspectives on how to provide support to pupils and their families. 

Rachel shared why the team got involved with Poverty Proofing®, “We wanted to take part in the audit because we don’t know what we don’t know. Having a third-party organisation come and speak to our pupils, parents and stakeholders enabled them to share their voices without feeling overwhelmed. It was the right time to do it because the cost-of-living crisis is putting greater financial pressure; I want to ensure we are working with our community towards better outcomes for our pupils.” 

With the school already heavily investing in creating an inclusive, equitable experience for pupils, what did the Poverty Proofing® report findings offer? 

“The big outcome of taking part in the audit was changes to the ways we reach families with opportunities to access help,” explains Rachel, “we were sharing things on social media and ad hoc, but lots of families who could benefit weren’t seeing all the support available to them. In particular, we found that new families that joined during the school year were missing out.” 

“It really did deliver new understanding of how we can help our pupils and families.”

Getting the word out became an overnight priority and, as Katie explained, they now have a system in place to stop any family slipping through the net, “We now have a dedicated termly newsletter that goes out to all families, including paper copies, through email and on social. It lists each individual support opportunity and has my contact details on so any parent/carer can reach out about the challenges affecting them. Any family joining during the school year is given a copy so they can see straight away what help is available and how to access it.” 

Rachel adds, “We also moved Katie’s office from a space accessible through the staff room to a larger, more central location. This makes her more visible and accessible to everyone, from pupils to parents to the professionals attending the school and working with the children.” 

The school are now putting into action a long-term plan from the findings of the audit, which has been embraced by staff and governors. 

What is their advice to a school thinking about going through the Poverty Proofing® process? 

Rachel shares her view, “Just go for it! It can feel on paper like a big commitment, speaking to every pupil, and sensitive inviting the scrutiny of your communities, but it isn’t onerous. Reflecting on the frame of mind we started with, ‘you don’t know what you don’t know’, it really did deliver new understanding of how we can help our pupils and families.” 

“It’s useful to be aware it’s a conversation”, Katie adds, “for example, the team explored how lunch bags for free school meal pupils on trips can reduce stigma, but due to the number of kids who receive them in this school this played out differently at Swalwell. The process, it’s about what is right for your pupils, and we are always eager to have an open conversation about that.”

Our latest recruit to the Little Minds in Mind team, Parent-Infant Practitioner Halema Khan, shares her experience of joining Children North East in this new blog. It was a special week to join the service, as Infant Mental Health Awareness Week saw celebration and advocacy of supporting babies mental health in during their first 1,001 days across the UK. 

What an amazing first week it’s been! Where do I start?! Well, I can truly say my journey started the moment when I saw the job advertised by Children North East for Parent-Infant Practitioner and said to myself… “That’s my kind of job, I would love to do this”. And here I am, fast forward six weeks, sitting in my new office with my new team within Therapeutic Services.

I felt at that moment that with my new role and collaborative working, it cemented my decision that I can truly make a difference!

It was a mixture of nerves and excitement but I observed everyone’s passion for supporting new mothers and babies, which is being delivered through our Little Minds in Mind Programme. Little Minds in Mind focusses on the importance of strengthening crucial parent-infant relationships, bonding and attachment, and baby brain development. With my keen interest already in this area, I thought to myself that I made a good decision to come and work for Children North East.

Day one entailed getting ‘geared up’ with my essentials: laptop, lanyard and a cup of tea, followed by a mass introduction to the wider team at Head Office and our Graingerville site. Then I was whisked off to support the launch of the new Community Family Hub in the Outer West of Newcastle, promoting Little Minds in Mind.

My passion to support families, children and babies has always remained close to my heart.

What can I say? It was a great event, with children, families and professionals all under one roof! It was a perfect opportunity for me to ‘Meet and Network’ with local services for ages ranging from 0-19 (Midwifery and Health Visiting, Healthworks, NAPI, citywide community family Hub teams, breastfeeding support, antenatal services, Mental Health Services, Family Partners and many community and Voluntary agencies). You name it, they were all there! There was a real buzz of excitement and I felt at that moment that with my new role and collaborative working, it cemented my decision that I can truly make a difference!

As an Early Years Professional (and a mother of four children) I’ve worked within the 0-19 service, Castle Nurseries, Voluntary Service and SMART Multi Academy Trusts, but my passion to support families, children and babies has always remained close to my heart. To be able to deliver workshops and groups focussing on Preparing for Baby and Baby’s Here sounded so exciting!

Day two was a blend of getting to know my new colleagues (who are the loveliest bunch of people), as well as going through all essential policies, procedures, training and health and safety. It was also an opportunity for me to understand my role and its delivery within the community.

Day three was exciting. We attended the ‘1001 Critical Days Conference‘. To see so many more different services and professionals all sitting together, who all work with children and families, was great. It was a mix blend of listening to guest speakers and group discussions, and a real opportunity for for partnership working. I visited the Cowgate Centre, the fantastic community family hub in the Inner West of Newcastle, which Children North East run (with its lovely Cafe Hope). I was in awe of all the great activities and opportunities on offer for the local community and loved meeting the dedicated team who work so passionately! Overall, It has been a very busy week both enriching and positive and I cant wait to get started!

As we get prepped to join Ouseburn Family Pride this weekend (rubber ducks at the ready!), we wanted to share this story of why these events are so important to our communities. 

In 2022, our teams took part in Northern PRIDE, which united over 30,000 people to celebrate LGBTQ+ communities, culture and heritage across our region. The day started with a very special moment shared with the PLUS (People Like Us) Group, a youth-led group for people under 19 who are wanting or needing support relating to their gender or sexuality, which Children North East hosts.  

Our team supported group members to march, commissioning a banner designed by the young people to carry, promoting the group and decorated with words they connect their experiences with PLUS such as ‘Safe Space’, ‘Self-acceptance’ and ‘Friendship’. For many it was the first time they had marched and, in an exciting turn of events, the leading groups of the march, officially appointed by organisers, invited PLUS to join them at the front.  

Children North East’s Quinn Stanger, who works closely with the PLUS Group and marched with them on the day commented, “It was a fantastic and emotional day seeing the young people proud and empowered to be themselves. Growing up in a heteronormative world, it can be challenging and upsetting ‘not fitting in’. Pride, and in particular the march, was an opportunity for our young people to be with many others who are ‘out and proud’ whilst seeing acceptance from the wider population. Alongside the weekly support from the group, it was affirmation they can be who they are and embrace their identity.” 

“It was affirmation they can be who they are and embrace their identity.”

We believe in our purpose of supporting every young person to grow up healthy and happy is only possible if we empower young people to be themselves. Northern PRIDE shares this ambition of supporting and championing LGTBQ+ young people by offering community, visibility and acceptance, which some may struggle to find in their daily lives. 

This highlights one reason PRIDE is such an important event for Children North East. We believe in our purpose of supporting every young person to grow up healthy and happy is only possible if we empower young people to be themselves. Northern PRIDE shares this ambition of supporting and championing LGTBQ+ young people by offering community, visibility and acceptance, which some may struggle to find in their daily lives. 

If you’re heading to Ouseburn Family Pride, come and say hello to the team! 

Children North East has responded to the government’s Children’s Social Care Strategy. In our response, we echoed our support for many of the ambitious proposals to put love and caring back at the heart of children’s social care. However, we also set out why we believe the government to properly resource the plan and have the courage to go further and faster in bringing more support to struggling families, in order to stem the tide of more and more children coming into care.   

Love Matters is the title, and overwhelming message, of the report by the Church of England’s Commission on Households and Families, published last month, which Children North East contributed to. The report is unequivocal in stating that strong, loving relationships within the home, family and community are essential for all of us to thrive.  

It is encouraging that this priority is echoed in the draft Children’s Social Care strategy – Stable Homes, Built on Love. The strategy clearly commits to re-orientating Children’s Social Care to put stable, secure, loving attachments for all babies, children and young people at its heart. This is a vital component of a happy and healthy childhood and should be our overriding aim for all babies, children and young people. 

In particular, the strategy commits to:  

• Establishing a new Family Help model to support families when they need it to overcome barriers which prevent them from providing the safe, secure, loving homes children need 
• A greater focus on the role extended family can play when primary carers are struggling, including kinship care  
• Exploring how care-experienced young people can have a lifelong bond with another person which provides the emotional and practical support they need as they navigate adulthood  

All of these are hugely important if we are to create a social care system which above all enables children to grow up in loving homes, with strong attachments to consistent caregivers, and have the best possible chance to grow up happy and healthy and to go on to thrive as adults. The challenge is making it happen.  

In our response, we have highlighted a number of practical considerations for making policy change a reality for children and their families, in particular championing the role the charity sector can play in delivering these priorities. However, we have also strongly stated that to have an impact, the strategy needs to be properly resourced and rolled out nationally as soon as possible. The funding committed falls far short of what is needed, and without adequate funding, it will be impossible to achieve the vision set out, and our social care system will continue to fail some of the most vulnerable children in our society.   

Family Help 

The best outcome for any child is that they are loved and cared for by their birth family in a safe, stable home. Supporting the family at the earliest opportunity to overcome difficulties and maintain that safe, loving home, should always be the priority. Support for families has been eroded in recent years by squeezed budgets and soaring costs. Without it, families are struggling for longer, children are not getting the love and care they need, and we are missing opportunities to intervene earlier and prevent children entering the care system. The number of looked after children is continuing to rise, and proper investment in early intervention provision is critical to stem the tide.  

Family Help should be available to all families who need it. There needs to be clear expectations and accountability for Directors of Children’s Social Care about what Family Help should include, and thresholds for intervention to create a consistent offer nationally. We also need clear guidance for how Family Help interfaces with Family Hubs to create a seamless continuum of support, without families being bounced around or falling through the gaps.  

Strong local leadership and culture change will be critical to unpick risk averse practices that make families feel they are being monitored rather than helped, and achieve the vision of families and services working together to care for children, without fear, stigma or judgement. Specifically, we need a better approach to families affected by domestic abuse, protecting the victim and their children as a unit, rather than making victims responsible for protecting children from the abuser.  

There needs to a clear expectation on Social Care Directors to work with the Voluntary and Community Sector to design and deliver Family Help. This would build on the strength of the VCS in existing relationships of trust with communities, which can break down some of the fear families have of social care involvement, to enable families and services to work together to protect children.  

Friends and Family 

Family and friends who already have bonds of love, affection and trust with children, are often the best placed to care for them if they can’t remain in the family home. We welcome the commitment to involving the wider family network earlier via family-group decision making, and strengthening policy on kinship care. A kinship care placement must always be the best option for that family, not just a way of saving costs.  

The redoubled focus on the role of friends and family needs to be backed up with the resources to support them. Kinship carers are often hit by increased living costs and loss of earnings because of reducing paid work in order to care for children. We need a clear and fair system to kinship carers are able to live comfortably and not pushed into poverty. There also needs to be long-term practical support for kinship carers as they navigate the twists and turns of raising the children in their care.  

Loving Support for Young Adults 

Most young people continue to rely on their parents well into adulthood, and it is unsurprising care leavers who don’t have a secure long-term attachment they can rely on experience poor outcomes around homelessness, unemployment and crime. We are pleased the Care Strategy is seriously considering ways to address this, but know it is a complex problem to solve. Providing a way for care-experienced children to form lifelong bonds could make a big difference to their journey into independence.  

The biggest issue facing many care leavers is the lack of accommodation, which is safe, welcoming and offers the kind of support most young people living alone for the first time receive from their families. The government must urgently review the scale of need for regulated placements for care leavers, and commit to funding proper, well-designed, regulated provision across the country, to ensure all care leavers have a safe place to live when they move out of their placement.  

The Elephant in the Room  

Our biggest concern with the strategy is that funding committed falls far short of what is needed to achieve the ambitions and vision. Given the scale of need in Children’s Social Care, small-scale short-term Family Help pathfinders is the wrong approach.  Wholesale reform of Family Help is needed now provide reliable and effective support to families when they need it and reverse the flow of more children coming into local authority care. The government should go much further and much faster in implementing reform, with sufficient funding for it to have the impact needed.  

Realising the reform of Children’s Social Care is a hugely complex piece of system change, but it is immeasurably important for every single child who finds him or herself in need of its protection. Morally, socially and economically, we have a duty to the most vulnerable children in our communities to get this right, and the whole of society will benefit if we do.  

Wallsend Jubilee Primary is passionate about creating a school experience that makes everyone feel valued. The school has a strong track record of supporting its diverse community of children, 39% of whom are eligible for free school meals, with Ofsted recently praising the leaders and staff for their understanding of its disadvantaged pupils.

What could this school, already engaged with the unique challenges of their pupils living in poverty, gain from the Poverty Proofing® process?

Catching up with Joanne Tappenden, Pupil Premium Leader, and Rebecca Hawkins, Deputy Headteacher, this message shines through from the start.

Joanne explains, “We don’t want any of our pupils to miss out on the opportunities that could give them the best start in life or feel pressured by situations they encounter. Before we took part in Poverty Proofing® the team already had some great practices in place promoting an inclusive school day, but we thought taking part would give us the chance to hear new perspectives, new ideas and identify different ways of doing things.”

Rebecca continues, “We approached Poverty Proofing® as a way of adjusting and amending our current ways of working, rather than wiping the slate. Our advice to anyone starting on the journey is to be open to the process, but we also wanted to ensure everyone had ownership over the parts which impacted them rather than imposing from the top; from staff and pupils to families and governors.”

Making changes at a speed that carefully considers ‘what is right for the school’ is a recurrent theme in our conversation, with staff creating ‘space for debate’ and being thoughtful about the pace in which they ask new ways of doing things of parents. However, there has also been a flurry of creative actions off the back of the school’s report, addressing the ‘little things’ that can make a big impact on a pupil’s day-to-day experience.

“There were some things that felt easy to address and after getting the pupils perspective we wanted to act on quickly”, shares Joanne.

“The school photo process will be revised so that students now ‘opt-in’ and discreetly get their picture taken. This removes the pressure of buying prints from families and children don’t face feeling uncomfortable knowing they are having a photo taken their families won’t be able to afford.”

Other initiatives we are going to pursue include allocating money from Pupil Premium funds to pay for music tuition when a student shows a real passion; changing the way birthdays are celebrated so there isn’t pressure on students to bring in treats from home; doing donation drives for a dress up box so all students can participate in costume activities; and launching a drop-in for families to access money management and benefits advice.

One exciting area that has taken off is the appointment of ‘Eco Warriors’ in every class, who have recently managed a swap shop and play an important role in reducing the stigma around recycling uniform.

“We want the students to see it as normal to reuse and recycle and the uniform project is something they’ve definitely embraced. There are permanent donation boxes which they help us sort and organise. We

want to develop an environment that isn’t materialistic and where pupils value the ‘free’ opportunities in life. Eco Warriors has been a great addition to that culture.”

In keeping with the step-by-step approach, they are exploring a range of other ways to support families, from savers schemes for parents to reviewing their behaviour policy to ensure it doesn’t create additional barriers for children dealing with challenges outside of school.

Asking about the value the process has given Wallsend Jubilee, the importance of discussion comes up.

Joanne explains, “The training for staff really hits home and engages you in the challenges faced by pupils living in poverty and their families. This sets up discussion between different members of the team and we saw them sharing case studies of their own experience with pupils that would otherwise never have been highlighted.

“In the long-term, taking part was another way to ensure we are offering a school experience in which everyone feels valued, and the process has been an important part of our journey towards achieving that goal.”

Our Chief Executive Leigh Elliott shares the charity’s view on the Devolution Deal for the North East and the impact it will have on the lives of babies, children and young people across the region. 

Children North East works with babies, children, young people and families across the North East. We know that people’s lives do not neatly fit into the boundaries created by Local Authorities, as they move around for education, access to healthcare, specialist services and opportunities. For this reason, the current arrangement of two Combined Authorities North and South of Tyne doesn’t work for many people and has had less opportunity to improve infrastructure and systems which work region-wide and impact on the daily lives of families in the region. We therefore wholly welcome the new proposals for a devolved Mayoral Authority covering the seven Local Authorities of Durham, Northumberland and Tyne and Wear.   

Young people gaining independence, frequent, affordable, reliable public transport and safe routes to walk and cycle are critical.

We are particularly pleased about the transport settlement of funding included with the Devolution Deal, and the powers it will provide the new Mayoral Authority with to design, invest and manage transport services around the needs of local people.  

Experience of, access to and availability of transport, especially public transport is a recurring theme in our consultation work with young people and families across the region. For families without access to a car, and young people gaining independence, frequent, affordable, reliable public transport and safe routes to walk and cycle are critical in enabling them to access services they need, make the most of opportunities available to them, and ultimately to grow up happy and healthy.  

We know that the costs of public transport journeys involving two or more providers are particularly prohibitive for many families, especially the nearly 40% of children in the North East who are growing up in poverty. Integrated ticketing has the potential to be a game-changer for many people and we are thrilled to see this is a core part of the Devolution Deal agreement. We hope there will be further opportunity to collaborate in the review and refresh of the Regional Transport Plan over the next 12 months, to ensure that the voices of young people, and the needs of families living in poverty, can be fully considered and prioritised.   

Reducing pollution from vehicles in the communities where children live and study will make a huge impact on their wellbeing. 

We are pleased that decarbonisation of travel is also a priority within the deal, as air pollution and air quality is one of the biggest causes of poor respiratory health in children and young people in our region. Reducing pollution from vehicles in the communities where children live and study will make a huge impact on their wellbeing.   

Access to affordable, high-quality housing is a huge priority for families with children in our region. The North East has the second highest ‘After-Housing Costs’ poverty rate in the country (with only London faring worse). Whilst the deal does not commit a huge amount of funding initially to support investment in housing, particularly social housing, which is so desperately needed, increased powers at a regional level, is an opportunity to ensure a coordinated approach to tackling the housing issues facing our region and children growing up here.   

Finally, we are thrilled that the Devolution Deal becomes the first in the country to contain a specific commitment to addressing Child Poverty, building on the work already being undertaken in the North of Tyne Combined Authority area. We have been privileged to support this work and would welcome the opportunity to be a strategic partner, bringing the wealth of expertise and evidence collated through our Poverty Proofing© work in schools, healthcare, cultural organisations and community settings, to enable the NECMA to lead the way in tackling and preventing child poverty so all babies, children and young people are able to grow up happy and healthy.