New horizon
“Joseph was initially referred to us because there was a risk of him going into custody in the future due to a recent offence.
I’ve been working with him for a few months now and can honestly say he’s already on a very constructive path to a positive future. His journey towards pro-social identity development is more linear than anyone I’ve ever seen!
Joseph’s been engaging extremely well in many ways. He’s really focused on the future and doing everything he can to not go into custody. He keeps all of his appointments with both me and his YOT Manager, he does his community service and he always replies to messages and maintains good communication.
As practitioners we often talk about developing resettlement plans that are co-created with the child. And with Joseph he truly is co-creating his plan. He’s shaping it his way, bringing lots of ideas to each meeting and talking about his interests and hopes for the future. That’s made it so much easier to facilitate the right structural support for his development, because I can base it around these interests. And because the practical activities I’ve been helping to facilitate for Joseph are linked to his interests and hopes for the future, his engagement levels seem to get higher and higher. It’s really keeping him focused on a positive path.
Joseph’s gained employment and has been working for a couple of months now. He told me he enjoys the role of being a worker and an ‘earner’ and we’ve explored how this makes him feel.
I’ve helped Joseph to focus his spare time and effort on other constructive activities too. For example, he’s been accessing therapy through our services to explore his family relationships and sense of identity.
He also mentioned that it would be useful to his work if he could drive. So, I helped him to obtain his provisional licence and apply for funding for driving lessons. He was so excited to start them and after a few lessons he began to talk about how independent he’d feel to be able to drive.
The funding recently ran out halfway through his lessons, so I’ve helped Joseph to apply for additional funding. I know that the additional funding won’t be guaranteed, so I’ve been completely open and transparent with Joseph about the status of the application. We’ve been working together on developing a contingency plan that centres around budgeting so that Joseph can continue with his lessons if the additional support doesn’t come through. I want him to understand that contingency plans are important for when things don’t go the way we want them to.
Because Joseph has been engaging so well with creating a pro-social future for himself, his YOT Manager is actually looking to close his case earlier than the initial referral order set out. I’ve explained that this is a really positive outcome and that he should be proud of what he’s achieved in such a short space of time. I’ve also reassured him that it doesn’t mean that my support comes to an end and that I’d like to keep in touch.
Over the coming weeks I’ll be focusing on explaining to Joseph that at New Horizon Youth Centre we can continue to support him for years to come, whether that’s in the form of informal meetings to chat through how he’s doing or whether that’s facilitating practical help to enable him to continue leading a positive life.”
In my first review meetings with children, I always start by going through their referral notes to check that the recommendations for structural support are based on what the child wants. Sometimes things have changed since the initial referral and they want to shape their plan in a new direction. At their young age I think this is completely normal to expect some fluidity in which options they want to explore.
One thing I’ve found really helpful in meetings and visits with children is to start by asking them what they want to talk about. I say things like, “Let’s create an agenda of things we’d like to chat about in our session. I have a couple of things I want to add to the list, but what would you like to start with?”
