Children's Home run by Aspireone Care Ltd in Staffordshire

Inspection report children’s home: 1228191 1 Registered provider: Aspireone Care Ltd

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Full inspection Inspected under the social care common inspection framework

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Information about this children’s home

The home provides emergency, medium- and long-term placements for two children and young people, aged between eight and 18 years old, who have come from a variety of situations, backgrounds and experiences and who have a range of complex needs.

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Information about this children’s home

The newly registered manager is very experienced and holds the level 5 diploma in leadership and management for children’s residential care. The previous registered manager has remained in the company in a new role.

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Overall experiences and progress of

children and young people, taking into account

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outstanding

How well children and young people are helped and protected outstanding

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outstanding

The effectiveness of leaders and managers outstanding

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outstanding

The children’s home provides highly effective services that consistently exceed the standards of good. The actions of the children’s home contribute to significantly improved outcomes and positive experiences for children and young people who need help, protection and care.

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outstanding

Date of last inspection: 23 October 2018

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outstanding

Overall judgement at last inspection: good

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outstanding

Enforcement action since last inspection: none Inspection report children’s home: 1228191 2

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Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement

23/10/2018 Full Good 07/03/2018 Interim Sustained effectiveness 19/09/2017 Full Good 10/11/2016 Full Requires improvement Inspection report children’s home: 1228191 3

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Recommendations

 Staff should be familiar with the home’s policies on record keeping and understand the importance of careful, objective recording. (‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’, page 62, paragraph 14.4)

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: outstanding

Young people say that this is their home and that staff are like family members. They love living here and benefit from the security and stability that they feel. Young people who have previously struggled to trust adults form exceptionally warm and caring relationships with nurturing, highly committed staff. One young person says that she ‘adores’ the staff and is confident that they really care about her.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: outstanding

The welcoming, comfortable home provides young people with a calm, reassuring environment where they can focus on their own needs. They engage in therapy and talk to staff about deeply personal and sometimes distressing issues that affect their lives. Staff provide young people with exceptional support which strengthens their emotional well-being, self-esteem and confidence.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: outstanding

Motivated, dynamic staff provide young people with opportunities to try new, fun and stimulating experiences including horse riding and boxing. Young people also enjoy football, swimming lessons and ice skating and attend local youth clubs. One young person was delighted when staff took her on a trip to London to the headquarters of a large social media company.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: outstanding

Staff support helps young people to thrive and make excellent progress in their physical health and social development. One young person attends a young person’s forum, where she has been praised for speaking confidently and positively about her experience of being in care. She supports other young people in the group, who, as she says, need to be heard.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: outstanding

Young people benefit hugely from individualised care that recognises their specific needs and choices. Staff enable one young person to attend church regularly. Dedicated, perceptive staff use their training and experience in autism spectrum disorder to ensure that a young person receives the structure and information that he needs to manage his anxieties and support his emotional well-being. Staff support young people to enjoy positive visits to see their families.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: outstanding

Young people communicate their views, wishes and feelings very confidently. They are assured that staff listen to them and take their views seriously. Staff provide young Inspection report children’s home: 1228191 4 people with independent advocates when young people need additional support. Young people enthusiastically engage in the regular young people’s meetings. They like to write the minutes and take the opportunity to influence decisions that are made. Staff researched the most effective way of encouraging young people to read and contribute to their records. As a result, they provided young people with their own computer tablet. Young people use this every day to read what has been written about them and add their own comments. Young people really appreciate the exceptional openness and the inclusion that this affords them. This has made a real difference to young people’s lives and the influence that they have on decisions that affect them. Staff have also

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: outstanding

introduced a regular newsletter for young people about what is happening in the home.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: outstanding

Young people feel highly valued and staff are ambitious for them. Staff use their in- depth understanding of each young person to meet their needs and enable them to achieve positive outcomes. Both young people are making significant, sustained progress. Both attend full-time education and have made progress beyond expectations from their starting points. One young person is a school prefect and a ‘study buddy’, helping younger pupils, and has achieved top marks in drama and food technology. The other young person, who had not attended and engaged in school in the past, now has 100% attendance and loves school. Both young people have also made exceptional progress socially and have made friends locally. They are involved in planning for their future and are better at understanding and regulating their emotions and behaviour. Their resilience has also increased.

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How well children and young people are helped and protected: outstanding

Staff receive excellent regular, face-to-face and online training in subjects including safeguarding, radicalisation, young people who go missing, self-harm and child exploitation. Drug prevention workers and the police have delivered additional training to staff. This training included topics such as county lines. An ex-gang member is meeting with the team to share his knowledge and experience and a worker from the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (NSPCC) is also due to visit to talk to the team about sexually harmful behaviour. Staff are extremely well informed and vigilant. They use their knowledge to keep young people safe. Young people feel safe.

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How well children and young people are helped and protected: outstanding

Staff work creatively with young people to help them to understand risks and how to keep themselves safe. They discuss important issues including sexual exploitation and staff support young people to enjoy free time safely. For some young people, this is a hugely significant step and reduces their vulnerability.

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How well children and young people are helped and protected: outstanding

Staff develop strong nurturing relationships with young people. They understand young people’s emotional needs, the reasons behind their behaviour and how to respond to young people to reduce the risk of harm. Staff use praise and rewards to encourage positive behaviours and use rules and boundaries to provide young people with a strong sense of security and safety. Excellent key-work sessions help young people to reflect on incidents. Safeguarding issues are revisited with young people and these discussions are highly effective. Inspection report children’s home: 1228191 5 Proactive, creative work with other professionals is a real strength of the staff team’s safeguarding practice. For example, when a young person was found to have visited a derelict building with friends, the registered manager immediately contacted the appropriate agencies including the local council. The building was quickly boarded up

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How well children and young people are helped and protected: outstanding

and made safe. Bullying does not happen in the home, but when incidents occur at school, staff liaise with education staff on a daily basis to monitor and address the issues.

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How well children and young people are helped and protected: outstanding

Risk assessments are high-quality, detailed and relevant. They address each young person’s behaviours and triggers and provide staff with highly effective strategies to reduce the risk of incidents occurring. The registered manager reviews the risk assessments and behaviour management plans regularly and has recently amended individual risk assessments to ensure that they have a strong focus on young people’s physical and mental health. Staff use an assessment tool, sourced from a local authority, to enhance their understanding of, and capacity to successfully address, harmful sexual behaviour.

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How well children and young people are helped and protected: outstanding

The number of times when young people harm themselves has reduced significantly since the last inspection and no young person has gone missing since January 2019. Staff do not have to use physical intervention.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: outstanding

The registered manager is highly experienced. He provides strong leadership and is a positive role model for staff, reflecting the ethos and aims of the service. He ensures that staff are constantly developing and learning. He understands the strengths and weaknesses of the team and works with staff in regular team meetings, reflective supervision sessions and via training to continually improve their practice.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: outstanding

The registered manager is very child-focused and has strong, supportive relationships with young people and staff. Young people’s transitions are well planned, and staff continue to support one young person who has left the home. The young person also left an encouraging message for new young people when they moved in. The message reassured them that this is the best placement that they could have. Matching procedures are excellent and result in a settled home where young people feel secure. They enjoy each other’s company and make exceptional progress. Staff and the registered manager actively promote equality and diversity and value individuality.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: outstanding

The home is extremely well run. The registered manager is constantly improving the service to drive up standards even further. Staff supervisions and young people’s key- work sessions are now linked to each of the quality standards. This helps staff to focus on the aims of their work with young people and how best to meet their individual needs. The registered manager has skilfully introduced new staff to the home with limited impact on the young people, who have quickly formed warm and trusting relationships with them.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: outstanding

Staff love working here and feel strongly supported by the registered manager and the Inspection report children’s home: 1228191 6 team. They feel that the training they receive is excellent and that it enables them to carry out their roles to a high standard. Staff induction is thorough and effective, and staff benefit from input from the in-house clinical psychologist to understand the young people’s complex needs. Staff benefit from reflective supervision and regular team meetings where their input is highly valued, and discussions are child-focused. Team meetings are used to explore a wide range of relevant topics, including models of attachment, to strengthen staff knowledge and practice.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: outstanding

The registered manager is passionate about developing staff knowledge and skills for the benefit of young people. He has identified additional external training, purchased relevant books and resources for the team and given staff extra individual responsibilities. The registered manager is contributing to an innovative local authority research project on promoting emotional well-being in children’s homes. This project aims to develop new resources for young people and to strengthen multi-agency working.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: outstanding

The registered manager and staff team have excellent links with other professionals. This ensures flexible and creative planning for each young person. The registered manager attends a local authority regional manager meeting, which includes the police, to gain updates on trends and crime hotspots in the local area.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: outstanding

Staff communication is excellent. They analyse incidents in great depth and focus on how they can improve their practice. However, sometimes this work is not captured in all written records. This has not had a negative impact on young people because incidents are discussed in team meetings and staff supervision sessions.

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Information about this inspection

Inspectors have looked closely at the experiences and progress of children and young people. Inspectors considered the quality of work and the differences made to the lives of children and young people. They watched how professional staff work with children and young people and each other and discussed the effectiveness of help and care provided. Wherever possible, they talked to children and young people and their families. In addition, the inspectors have tried to understand what the children’s home knows about how well it is performing, how well it is doing and what difference it is making for the children and young people whom it is trying to help, protect and look after.

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Information about this inspection

Using the ‘Social care common inspection framework’, this inspection was carried out under the Care Standards Act 2000 to assess the effectiveness of the service, how it meets the core functions of the service as set out in legislation, and to consider how well it complies with the Children’s Homes (England) Regulations 2015 and the ‘Guide to the children’s homes regulations including the quality standards’. Inspection report children’s home: 1228191 7

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Children’s home details

Registered provider address: 4 Lyme Drive, Lyme Vale Court, Parklands, Stoke-on- Trent, Staffordshire ST4 6NW

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Inspector

Louise Whittle, social care inspector Inspection report children’s home: 1228191 8 achieve excellence in the care of children and young people, and in education and skills for learners of all ages. It regulates and inspects childcare and children’s social care, and inspects the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (Cafcass), schools, colleges, initial teacher training, further education and skills, adult and community learning, and education and training in prisons and other secure establishments. It assesses council children’s services, and inspects services for children looked after, safeguarding and child protection.

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Inspector

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Inspector

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Inspector

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