Response to the Children and Young People's Service Quality Audit – June 2006

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Thank you to everyone who took the time to complete the quality assurance questionnaire sent out before the summer holidays.

The overall feedback was very positive and we were delighted to hear your comments as well as your thoughts and suggestion as to ways we can continue to develop and improve. These are detailed opposite.

Click here to return to the ChYPS Quality Audit 2006.

General Support

You asked for more information in communication books:

We will introduce a template format to communication books to try and help improve the quality of information and ensure consistency across settings.

You thought that staff didn’t always have time to read children’s All About Me documents and that some of the questions they asked you indicated this:

We will remind staff about the importance of reading children’s All About me documents, there is time built in for this in every setting. On the bigger play schemes, when we may have up to 25 children a day, we ask staff to become familiar with the routine of a few children, rather than the whole group. This may mean that they ask questions about the children they are less familiar with. We will continue to look at ways of ensuring that staff access this information and make use of it.

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You said that you would prefer staff to use their initiative rather than always ask parents for suggestions:

This is a difficult balance to achieve as we always turn to parents for their thoughts and suggestions in the first instance before making our own. This is something we will discuss with individual parents.

You asked why staff needed individual training on each child’s gastrostomy and why parents weren’t able to demonstrate this:

Guidance from the Community Nurses, Commission for Social Care Inspection and the Royal College of Nursing indicates that every member of staff has to be individually trained on each child’s gastrostomy tube. If we don’t adhere to this guidance we will not comply with legislation.

You mentioned that sometimes there are a lot of new faces (staff) on the play schemes:

Staff turnover on the play schemes is higher than any other part of the children’s service as at some point the students will move on in their career. At most play schemes including Twinks unless exceptional circumstances arise a minimum of 50% of the staff will be have worked before and approximately 50% will be new. This still compares favourably with other schemes and we will continue to work hard on consistency for the children.

You said that at some events there were a number of people you didn’t recognise and it would be nice if they were introduced:

These people are usually our supporters, visiting families or colleagues who will often attend the Christmas Play, Sponsored Walk and similar events. We will ensure that there is a general introduction on occasions such as these so that we are able to welcome everybody.

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You weren’t always sure what your children did in the day:

We will start to display more information about the nursery day on the board outside nursery as well as send this home to families whose children come in on transport.

We will provide the activity programme for Treetops with details of back up options for activities as well as the main events.

You said that activities at Treetops were sometimes cancelled:

We do try to keep changes to activities as minimal as possible. Circumstances that lead to activities being cancelled include:
- inclement weather
- ill health of children or staff
- children arriving late.

Provision of the timetable with back up activities should help to address some of this and we will continue to work hard to keep cancellation to a minimum. We will speak individually to families who consistently drop their children off late so see whether we are able to find a solution.

You asked for a list to be sent home to the families of children visiting Treetops for them to indicate their preferred activities:

We will do this.

You asked for a touch screen computer in Treetops:

We have now got one.

You asked for horse-riding to be available for children with more severe physical disabilities:

We will investigate options for this and keep you informed.

You asked to use the sensory garden at White Lodge:

We hope to make this available to families next year during the holidays and at some weekends. We need to spend a little time thinking about how we manage this and ensure there isn’t an impact on the children attending play schemes and Treetops.

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You asked for a newsletter giving details of events and fundraising:

We will have introduced this by early next year, where possible we will make use of e-mail to distribute it.

You said that lists of dates sent were sometimes incomplete:

We will review the system of distributing dates and introduce a checking mechanism. We will also keep copies of all letters sent.

You asked for an on-line booking facility for Treetops:

We are now able to offer the facility to confirm and request dates by e-mail as we have an e-mail address for Treetops: treetops@whitelodgecentre.co.uk.

We are unlikely to reach the position of families being able to book and confirm their dates on line in the same way as a hotel system although we would like to, as we need to ensure that the children staying at Treetops are able to mix with each other well and we can only do this in person.

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Children’s Service

You asked to have a tour of the Children’s Centre facilities when you first attended:

All families are given a tour early in their contact with White Lodge Centre, however we think more consciously about the timing, as it is not always appropriate at the first visit.

You requested a Parents’ information swap board:

We would welcome greater usage of the board which was installed on the wall in the corridor between reception and the nursery.

You were concerned about security at reception:

In addition to the measures agreed immediately following last year’s audit, we invited our local Neighbourhood Support Officer to give us advice and have instituted further measures, including increasing the hours during which entrance via the inner door is directly controlled by the receptionist.

Family Support Services

You asked that we open up our training opportunities to families:

Details of the trainings have been advertised at White Lodge Centre and on our website; some of you have participated in these. You were also invited to sign up for our Health and Safety week workshops.

You asked that we provide some support for siblings of disabled children:

We recently ran a group for siblings of children with autism, which proved very successful. We are now seeking funding to develop this work.

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