Do you have the task of safeguarding and promoting the emotional well-being of children?  

Do you feel sufficiently trained/prepared for the complex, and frequently risky, nature of the tasks  required of you by the work?

Do you feel prepared to engage with the integrated children’s service agenda?

If not you maybe interested in an innovative multidisciplinary programme taught by clinical practitioners, actively engaged in clinical practice, research and consultancy. A course that will enable you to develop knowledge, clinical capabilities and skills working with complex child  and family work in voluntary, statutory and mental health settings.  

In partnership with
University of East London

Organising tutors
Peter Griffiths and Karen Tanner

Course aims

Drawing on the experience of working in multidisciplinary groups, the opportunity to develop a sophisticated understanding of the complexity of multi-agency working

•    A sound theoretical framework for understanding, safeguarding and promoting the developmental outcomes of children and adolescents

•    Knowledge of child and adolescent mental health, for use in everyday work.

•    The capabilities necessary to work with the anxieties, difficulties and legal issues such work entails.

•    The capability to undertake informed early assessment, skillful and effective  preliminary work and/or know how and where to refer children, young people and families on for more specialised treatment.

•    The skills and capabilities to work with complex long term cases.

•    A framework for understanding the organisational dynamics of child care and mental health practice within a policy context of integrated children’s  services. In particular the factors that can impede effective communication.

•    An enhanced professional expertise, particularly in working with unconscious processes.

•    The capacity to work skillfully with diversity.

Is this course for you?

• Candidates are normally expected to have least three years practice experience since qualification and to be in full-time or part-time posts in which they are working with children and/or families experiencing difficulties.

• Suitable for practitioners in social work, nursing, child and adolescent mental health, the newly emerging CAMHS workforce (e.g. child and adolescent primary mental health workers) and all those working with children, young people and families in the statutory, voluntary and/or private sectors.

Time commitment
One year, one day per week. Additional time required to undertake a young child observation and a period of therapeutic practice.

Assessment

• Successful completion of this programme can lead to progression onto the second year of one of the following three Postgraduate Diploma/MAs:

- Postgraduate Diploma/MA in Child and Adolescent Primary Mental Health Care Work (Ref. M42)

- Postgraduate Diploma/MA in Fostering and Adoption Studies (Ref. M25)

- Postgraduate Diploma/MA in Child Protection and Complex Child Care (Ref. M22).

All are validated by the GSCC for the Higher Specialist  and Advanced Award in Social Work (Children, Young People and Families)