Last week What Works for Children’s Social Care published its latest report. The report summarises the findings of a study of five techniques to guide those searching for research studies of relevance to children’s social care. Alison Weightman, who led the study from the Specialist Unit for Review Evidence (SURE) at Cardiff University in collaboration with the… Read More
CASCADE and What Works for Children’s Social Care: Partners in research but no longer the Research Partner
In November 2017, the Department for Education announced that CASCADE would be its Research Partner for the What Works Centre for Children’s Social Care. Nesta were awarded a contract to help incubate and deliver the Centre itself. It’s been nearly three years since then, and much has changed. The What Works Centre for Children’s Social Care has been renamed and firmly established… Read More
New Funding Announcement – The CASCADE Network
We are delighted to have received £2.9 million funding from Health and Care Research Wales to help us build an ambitious and exciting programme of work over the next five years. This funding will allow CASCADE and our partners in the School of Psychology, the Centre for Trials Research and SAIL (Secure Anonymised Information Linkage)… Read More
What is the point of child and family social work?
A blog by Professor Donald Forrester An edited version of this blog was previously published by the NSPCC I came into social work to help people. Helping social workers to help people is still why I do my job, albeit through research and teaching. And in every study we carry out we hear stories of… Read More
Why don’t more care-experienced young people go to university?
University can be one of the most exciting times in a young person’s life; they have the prospect of studying something they are really interested in, meet new people, have new experiences and have a place to make those first adult steps of independence into the world. With all this on offer, why are care… Read More
How has Covid-19 impacted the experience of Young People Leaving Care?
Coinciding with the start of National Care Leavers Week, a new research report is released today concerned with young people leaving care during Covid-19. The research was jointly funded by Voices from Care Cymru and Cardiff University, and involved contributions from 21 care experienced young people and 23 professionals. The report provides valuable insights into… Read More
Child Criminal Exploitation
Children’s social care practice faces several challenges to delivering better outcomes for young people – none more complex and damaging than criminal exploitation. Every day multi-agency services and practitioners are successfully safeguarding children, but when the system fails the effects are devastating to individuals, their families and our communities. With over twenty years’ experience of… Read More
CASCADE report recommends improvements to secure accommodation for children in Wales
The study was commissioned by Social Care Wales. A CASCADE led report, ‘The experiences and outcomes of young people from Wales receiving Secure Accommodation Orders’, published its findings and recommendations today. The aim of the study was to get a full and true picture of the experiences of children and young people from Wales placed… Read More
What Works ‘Change Projects’ show early signs of promise
Two new pilot ‘What Works for Children’s Social Care‘ projects have released their interim reports. The first project has placed social workers in schools in three local authorities in England and is showing early signs of improving inter-agency working and building more collaborative relationships with children, young people and families. Social workers have been embedded… Read More
CASCADE project exposes the outcomes for young people at risk of CSE
Today, the ‘Keeping Safe’ project findings, led by Dr Sophie Hallett, were released. The project analysed of the outcomes of work with sexually exploitedyoung people in Wales. 205 children and teenager case files, aged 9 to 18, were analysed and tracked over 10 a year period. The findings revealed one in three children had been… Read More