How to get experience with Children in care/care leavers?

[Bookaholic73]

I would love to work with children/teenagers in care/care leavers, as a support worker or other role (mentor etc) but not a SW.

I have plenty of experience working with adults and in mental health, but I’m finding it difficult to know how to get experience with working with looked after children.

I don’t want to retrain as a SW but could volunteer a day a week to get experience, but there are no local volunteer vacancies with this type of client.

Any suggestions would be welcome.

My DS goes to a specialist school which is for children with SEMH problems and very very many are in care or care experienced. I bet you could get a 1 day a week TA post at a school of that type.

Look up your Local Authorities Independent Visitor scheme. Its where volunteers are matched with children/young people in care to sort of befriend them, be companions, a friendly listening ear.
Here's a link for an example, each children services run their own version.
https://www.nottshelpyourself.org.uk/kb5/nottinghamshire/directory/service.page?id=evDxIgam1X4
Good luck and thank you for considering something like this, on behalf of the children in care I work with.

As above, your local authority will have some kind of independent visitors scheme/befriending scheme for youngsters in care who are always looking for volunteers. Also have a look at family support worker vacancies, they're not social workers but are used to carry out set pieces of work where families are under strain.

Check out your local authority care leavers offer , often a they are recruiting volunteers to work with care leavers. Jobs in residential units being a support worker is another option .

I worked with this demographic and there are specialist youth services that supply young people leaving care/ advocacy workers etc. Usually in my workplace we hired either social workers or youth workers but only took final year placement students because a lot of the young people we supported were vulnerable and had a lot of risks associated with their circumstances which a volunteer/ worker needed to be able to handle sensitively and appropriately. You could look into awareness courses. Care experienced people are everywhere and a lot will use other services like youth clubs or homeless services for example so it's maybe about paying attention to who you are working with rather than looking for a specialist service. Care experienced also looks like a lot of different things including kinship care, early independence, fostering, adoption, voluntary arrangements. Lots of young people live with a granny or auntie but aren't formally looked after. But the challenges are often similar.

Become an independent visitor

NYAS advocate?

Personal Adviser?

Staff member in supported accommodation?

I work with care experienced young people and teens in care - I work for a Virtual School

Thank you, this is the route I’m going to try first.

Just email your local council and they will tell you about their volunteer roles. We call them advocates. As above every LA uses different terminology.