St Helens Council
student placement opportunities
St Helen’s Children’s Services
Placements will continue to be organised by the university Placement Coordinator.
St Helens is a strong, resilient Council that respects and values the individuality and diversity that every employee brings to the Council. This Authority is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of Children, Young People and Adults within the Borough and expects all staff and volunteers to share this commitment. There are placement opportunities in teams with expertise in the following areas:
Futures Team
The Futures Team works with young people aged 16 – 25 leaving care .Under the Leaving Care Act 2000 the placement will involve working with Looked After Children and Care leavers to support them with pathway planning in their perpetration for the transition to adulthood.
Fostering & Adoption
St Helens are open to offer students the experience of working in a statutory service with the role mainly focusing on working with foster carers and their family as well as working with children we look after. The placement will benefit 100day placements as the assessments take a long time to complete therefore it will give a student the full experience and opportunities for assessment skills. It has to be a car driver due to agile working and the various places with tight schedules and timing; public transport would not be suitable. We offer a supportive and friendly environment that promotes growth and development.
Children with Disabilities
The opportunities a student would have on CWD team, would be to learn about completing assessments , assessing the need of the child and finding suitable care and support packages. We work with children who are profoundly disabled, children with autism and other syndromes/diagnosis. As a team we deal with child in need, child protection and children who are looked after and have a number of care proceeding cases. This would give the student experience of shadowing court cases.
FAST Team (Families Stay Together)
The FAST (Families Staying Together) service includes an Edge of Care Team consisting of Family Intervention Workers and 2 Senior Social Workers. The team work alongside the case holding Social Work teams to provide a service to children and their families who are felt to be at the edge of care. The team provides an intensive intervention service to these families over a period of 12 weeks with the aim of reducing risk, improving outcomes and preventing children from becoming looked after. The intensive work can be completed with both children, parents and the wider family. This includes both individual and at times some group work.
A Social Work student would be involved in the delivering of direct work alongside team members, progressing to delivering some of this individually with support. The intervention would include direct work with the families, liaising with case holding Social Workers and other professionals, attending and contributing to multi agency meetings. The placement would also provide opportunity to be involved in the planning of the work that individual families require. This would include utilising reflective skills to consider the families needs, the support and interventions that would be beneficial as a result of these needs and how to maximise engagement.
The FAST service also includes a Family Group Conference Team and Family Time Team and so there may also be opportunities for shadowing, observing and contributing to the work of these teams.
St Helen’s Adult’s Services
Placements will continue to be organised by the university Placement Coordinator.
St Helens is a strong, resilient Council that respects and values the individuality and diversity that every employee brings to the Council. This Authority is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of Children, Young People and Adults within the Borough and expects all staff and volunteers to share this commitment. There are placement opportunities in teams with expertise in the following areas:
Working Age Team
This placement will offer students the opportunity to work with service users who may experience learning disability, autism , physical and sensory disabilities, a mental health diagnosis ,substance use issues, homelessness. The team works with individuals aged 18-65 and their carers in accordance with the Care Act 2014 , Mental Health Act 1983- amended 2007 , The Mental Capacity Act 2005 , Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards and Safeguarding Adults policies and procedures