Children's Home run by Compass Children’s Homes Ltd in East Sussex

Inspection report for children’s home: 2644927 1 Registered provider: Compass Children’s Homes Limited

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Full inspection Inspected under the social care common inspection framework

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Information about this children’s home

This home is registered to provide care for up to eight children with social, emotional, and mental health difficulties. It is owned and run by a private organisation. At the time of the inspection, eight children were living in the home.

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Information about this children’s home

The manager has been registered with Ofsted since January 2023.

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Information about this children’s home

Some of the children living at the home attend the organisation’s school, which is located on the same site. Inspectors only inspected the social care provision.

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Overall experiences and progress of

children and young people, taking into account

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good

How well children and young people are helped and protected good

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good

The effectiveness of leaders and managers good

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good

The children’s home provides effective services that meet the requirements for good.

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good

Overall judgement at last inspection: outstanding

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good

Enforcement action since last inspection: none Inspection report for children’s home: 2644927 2

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Inspection date Inspection type Inspection judgement

31/08/2023 Full Outstanding Inspection report for children’s home: 2644927 3

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

When children come to live in the home, this is well planned. A wide range of information is considered to ensure that staff feel confident in their ability to meet the individual needs of each child. The family of one child who very recently moved to the home stated that the move had been very positive for the child and staff clearly understood the child’s needs.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Managers work closely with the wider professional network, such as social workers and police, to ensure that children get the support they need. Children are supported to maintain good overall physical and emotional health. Staff work with mental health services to get children the support that they need. They encourage children to participate in activities that support a healthy lifestyle, such as football and swimming.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Children enjoy a good range of activities that they can share with their friends. This helps them to have fun and build positive and healthy relationships. Where appropriate, children are helped to spend time with family and friends. Staff are sensitive and respectful when doing so. They are led by children’s feelings and wishes, and help children and their families to spend positive time together.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Children make progress in relation to their starting points. One child has recently taken driving lessons, while another has started to have more time unsupervised in the community.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Children’s views are important to staff. The children are consulted on changes to the home and have helped with choosing how the home will be redecorated. Children also help to devise plans for their evenings and weekends with staff, which enables them to pursue interests and try new things.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Children are supported to attend education regularly and engage with opportunities to learn. Some children have no identified education placements and have therefore missed opportunities to learn, socialise, and develop new skills and interests. Managers work closely with relevant professionals to try to identify opportunities for these children; however, progress has been slow. Where there have been issues with identifying appropriate school places for children, managers have worked with the virtual school team to get further support.

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Overall experiences and progress of children and young people: good

Children enjoy warm and nurturing relationships with staff, who understand their individual needs. They are guided to provide good-quality care through care plans and assessments that are relevant and regularly updated. However, some documents could be improved by ensuring that the language used is clear in its intention, as it can be difficult for children to understand. For example, some documents describe children as ‘erratic’ or ‘dysregulated’. Inspection report for children’s home: 2644927 4

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

When children go missing, staff take appropriate action and work well with the police and social workers to ensure that children return safely. They help children to understand why they may go missing, and help to find solutions that encourage them to keep themselves safe. For one child, this has included listening to their wishes to spend more time with friends and working with agencies to enable this to happen in a safe way. As a result of this work, episodes of the child going missing have reduced. On one occasion, managers recognised that staff had not followed the agreed protocols fully. They used this as an opportunity to reflect with the team to ensure that all staff were clear on what is expected when children go missing.

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

Staff have a clear understanding of their responsibilities to keep children safe. When concerns arise, staff respond appropriately. They share their concerns with appropriate people, such as managers and social workers, to ensure that children get the support that they need.

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

When children experience difficult feelings that lead to self-injury, staff respond in a caring and supportive way and ensure that children get the treatment they need. Staff work with health professionals, such as therapists and mental health services, to help children to find ways to explore their feelings and deal with them in safer ways. As a result, some children are starting to talk more openly about their feelings.

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

Staff are skilled in helping children to deal with difficult emotions. They look to understand what is going on for each child and find appropriate strategies to help children to stay safe. When physical restraint is used, it is always as a last resort. Staff use the least restrictive intervention for the shortest time possible to keep everyone safe. Managers always seek to learn from incidents and find better ways to support children. As a result, the frequency of these incidents has reduced.

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

When staff come to work in the home, managers undertake appropriate checks to ensure that new staff are vetted and safe to work with children.

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

Staff understand children’s risks and vulnerabilities. They are guided by clear and relevant plans that help them to keep children safe and support children to learn how to be safer. This includes recognising signs of stress that allow staff to offer the appropriate strategies to help children to manage their own feelings.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

Managers have good oversight of care practice and have created a clear vision for the home that staff understand and support. There is a keen focus on providing children with a sense of permanence, stability, and unconditional care. Managers have worked hard to address recommendations from the previous inspection. This has had a positive impact, with the quality of supervisions improving. Inspection report for children’s home: 2644927 5 Staff speak warmly of managers and the supportive team. They receive regular supervisions that help them to reflect on their own practice and access a range of training that is appropriate to the needs of the children. This helps them to feel more confident in their roles. Where there have been any identified gaps in training, managers have clear plans for supporting staff to complete all required training.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

Managers understand the progress that children make and celebrate this appropriately. They also have a good understanding of the barriers to children making progress and develop effective strategies to help children to make progress.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

Children’s views are important to staff, who ensure that children can speak to them and feel comfortable in exploring their needs and views. Managers ensure that children’s voices are heard and understood by the wider professional network, and act as good advocates for them when needed.

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The effectiveness of leaders and managers: good

Staff work closely with families and professionals, such as social workers, who feel that relationships are positive, with good communication being a key factor to this. Inspection report for children’s home: 2644927 6

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Recommendations

 The registered person should ensure that staff are familiar with the home’s policies on record-keeping and understand the importance of careful, objective, and clear recording. Information about the child must always be recorded in a way that will be helpful to the child. Specifically, managers must ensure that the language used in records is easy for children to understand and is clear in what it is describing. (‘Guide to the Children’s Homes Regulations, including the quality standards’, page 62, paragraph 14.4)

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Recommendations

 The registered person should ensure that staff act as effective advocates for or on behalf of a child who may be experiencing difficulties with education matters, including attendance. Specifically, managers should be able to demonstrate how they challenge decisions when children are without an identified education placement. (‘Guide to the Children’s Homes Regulations, including the quality standards’, page 28, paragraph 5.12)

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Information about this inspection

Inspectors have looked closely at the experiences and progress of children and young people, 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 for children’s home: 2644927 7

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Children’s home details

Registered provider: Compass Children’s Homes Limited

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Children’s home details

Registered provider address: 3 Rayns Way, Syston, Leicester LE7 1PF

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Inspectors

Jay Shekleton, Social Care Inspector Jacob Robson, Social Care Inspector Inspection report for children’s home: 2644927 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 looked after children, safeguarding and child protection.

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Inspectors

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Inspectors

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Inspectors

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