Parent Partnership - Parent Volunteers!!

[Anna85]

Hello,

I am hopefully going to be doing the Independent Parental Support Training with my local PP and just wondering if anyone else has done this or had experience of using one?

:-)

Blimey! I didn't know such things existed.

My exerience of using PP has been that they aren't as independent as they pretend to be unfortunately, but I do know others that have found them very useful.

This sounds like a good opportunity to feed back into the system though. Good luck.

Well I thought if anything it would be good for my own knowledge but also the whole SN areas really interest me. Since my DS was diagnosed with ASD I have spent hours reading up on things etc and would love to get into something around psychology/SEN!

Sounds really interesting. Good luck with it.

our service have taken on parent volunteers, haven't heard any complaints, the pp ladies have been over run recently so they need all the help they can get out to parents!

You know that thing where you skim read and see things the wrong way round, I read they had been run over recently

I worked as an IPS for a few years and found it very rewarding. Our Parent Partnership provided excellent training (about 12 full days) and shadowed new volunteers until they felt ready to take cases solo. There was always proper support and advice available.

Providing IPS is actually part of the SEN Code Of Practice.

I enjoyed supporting parents but did sometimes find the system frustrating - especially around exclusions.

Hope you find the role really rewarding.

Good luck! Let us know how you get on

I am currently an IPS in a very independent parent partnership. The service is funded by the LA but that is the only connection. I love it, it is really rewarding being able to help parents but as tibni it can be very frustrating. Exclusions are a nightmare, so may schools exclude illegally it is hard to believe. I have had loads of support and training from the service, they also funded my PTLLS course, so I can do parent programmes. IPS's have always been a part of our local PPS and because we have a good service in our area they are long standing, 1 has been there for 8 years.