(Integrated Children’s Services) Respected and Included Outcome Group 26th January 2016
Present: Maggie Hepburn (MH), Maggie Cruickshank (MC), Suzanne Somerville(SS) , Caroline Hastings (CH), Mike Melvin (MM), Evonne Llewellyn
(EL), Piotr Teodorowski (PT), Laurence Alfred (LA), Vicky Mackenzie (VM).
Apologies: Clare Paterson, Ellie Hepburn, Joyce Duncan, Craig Singer.
Agenda Point
Minute
Action Point
1. Welcome

All present at the meeting were welcomed.
2. Minutes of previous
meeting

There were no minutes from the meeting in December but several
actions had been agreed from that meeting around the group’s
involvement in the revision of the City’s Children and Young people’s
Participation Strategy. These actions were as follows:

The Aberdeen City Joint Inspection Action Plan (Respected and Included
Group actions) – can the group look through this plan as it has to be
submitted to the Improvement and Performance Board by the 8th January
2016. In particular there are some areas where it might be useful to have
detail of what is happening in the City i.e. Inclusion.
The draft Participation Strategy from Maxine Jolly – Maxine and I are meeting
on January 14th to look at this strategy and the current ICS one, with a view
to pulling them together into one strategy. Any comments about how best to
do this / what might be missing will be looked at in our planned meeting on
the 26th January, but please feel free to send in any comments before that.
The current Integrated Children’s Services Participation Strategy
The questionnaire that Maxine Jolly used with school pupils as part of the
evidence gathering for the draft strategy.
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
Who/When
3. Planned activity for
the group –
gathering the views
of children and
young people…next
steps.
Handouts looked at were:
the pupil questionnaire
from Maxine Jolly and the
questionnaire on mental
wellbeing from Elaine
McConnachie
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
At the meeting in December it was agreed that each member of the
Respected & Included Outcome group could usefully contribute to the
gathering of Children and Young People’s views by focusing on their
own specialist area.
LA suggested that the best way to elicit the views of Young People is to
ask trusted people to ask an agreed set of questions. What could then
happen is that young representatives of those groups with their trusted
worker could potentially be invited to the Respected and Included
group.
There needs to be a real sense that their views are being heard.
LA let the group now that the CYPVSPF (Children and Young People’s
Voluntary Sector Provider’s Forum) had agreed to put this onto the
Agenda for their next meeting.
The group then looked at the 1st questionnaire handout and made the
following points or asked the following questions;
How far reaching was the pupil survey?
Did it cover looked after and accommodated children?
Did it include pupils from Linn Moor and Camphill?
Was Maxine aware of any tools that were used to engage ASN
children?
Is the aim of the questionnaire to create a baseline data measure, and
has that been done?
Can the responses to the questionnaire be identified down to an
individual school/ pupil level, and what happens if a concern is
identified?
Has there been anything done around this with Primary School
children?
Caroline Hastings let the group know about the secondary Schools
Aspirations survey and will ask about whether there is information that
might be useful from this survey for eliciting the views of how included
young people feel. CH to get in touch with James Martin ACC to find
out more.
Ask Maxine Jolly
MH
Get in touch with
James Martin to
find out more
CH
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4. Participation
Strategy - feedback
from meeting with
Maxine Jolly
Vicky Mackenzie from Action for Children spoke about the assessment
tool, Outcomes Star, which Action for Children use, and how it is linked
to the wellbeing indicators (safe, healthy, active, nurtured, achieving,
respected, responsible and included). Vicky will share this with the
group for information.
The group agreed that when compiling questions it would be a good
idea to have them linked to the wellbeing indicators, to ensure GIRFEC
(Getting it Right for Every Child) processes are threaded through. It
was acknowledge that we would have to ensure the questions were
easy to understand and did not contain jargon.
Piotr agreed to take the two questionnaires to the Youth Council on the
23rd February to find out what the young people present thought of
them.
Maggie Hepburn went through the notes from her meeting with Maxine
Jolly about the Participation Strategy that has been written to help meet
some of the actions related to Participation in the joint inspection action
plan. We had discussed how the Respected and Included group could
contribute to the plan with knowledge about the young people they
work with.
Particularly we felt there was an absence of information about the
following groups:
 C & YP who may not be part of the general school population
The group agreed
to look at the
questionnaires in
relation to the
discussion and to
come to the next
meeting with their
thought on what to
include in a set of
questions and what
reach they might
have in their area
of expertise.
All
 LAC out of authority area
 Other youth groups and forums e.g. NHS Youth Forum, local
youth groups, young carers, advocacy services for children.
5. Vicky Mackenzie –
Action for Children
6. Action Plan
summary – where
are we with actions
Maggie Cruickshank asked about the possibility of carrying out an
improvement project around the implementation of the Participation
Strategy, and said she would send in a question via the group which
can be sent on to Maxine.
Send MC’s
question to Maxine
Jolly as part of the
group of questions
above
Maggie Hepburn will get in touch with Maxine and ask about the
specific timings for the launch and implementation of the Participation
Strategy.
Ask about the
timings of the
launch of the
Strategy.
MH
The Respected and Included group had invited Vicky Mackenzie along to the
meeting to share information about Action for Children’s part in the new Keen
4 work service. Keen 4 work is part of the employability pipeline, where CEYP
(care experienced young people) are supported to undertake work experience
training over 12 weeks and then job placements within the council where they
are mentored to help them to sustain the placement and have success. Vicky
also spoke about her role as Vice-Chair of GREC, and suggested that we
invite one of colleagues at GREC, Adriana Sokolowska, who works with Young
people in schools.
We looked through the summarised joint inspection action plan, at the
sections that relate to the Respected and Included group. We identified
that the following areas were still ongoing:
Development of a local Young Carer’s strategy
Send the
summarised action
plan out the group
MH
MH
from the R & I
group?
Support and contribution to the FAQ section of the Aberdeen Getting It
Right website.
Gathering information from other areas to benchmark the effectiveness
of engagement and involvement activities.
Caroline Hastings let the group know about the critical incident review
that has been taking place in response to the incident at Cults, and how
this will feed into an overarching policy being devised for the City.
7. AOCB
Mike Melvin updated the group on the Saltire Awards, and that ACVO
have a new worker in this area, Alan Clark.
Maggie Cruickshank shared that she was in her current post as
Improvement Manager for EYC / RAFA and PACE projects until the
31st March, and after that she will be moving back to her previous role
in Corporate Parenting. Maggie let the group know about the
Improvement activity in the City, and that she is undertaking the
Scottish Improvement Leaders Course.
Evonne Llewellyn let the group know that the NHS Youth event is going
to take place in November 2016. The venue is going to be Satrosphere
and it will be for 14-25 year olds. Evonne will be in touch to involve
Follow this up with
VSA
All
Enlist support for
this section of the
website over the
next 7 weeks
before its relaunch
on the 30th March
Collate information
on best practice
around
participation to
encourage
creativity in this
area
MH to collate
Group to sent
in information
about best/
creative/ new
practice in
engagement
and
participation
and send it in
to Maggie.
people at a later date.
Caroline Hastings let the group know about the Aberdeen Learning
Festival on Tuesday 16th February and delivering a homophobia in
schools seminar.
7.DONM
Maggie agreed to get in touch with the group with a suggested date in
March.
MH