Beautiful Minds: Nurturing and Promoting Mental Wellbeing in Children and Young People
5 October 2015 Thistle Hotel, The Royal Angus, Birmingham
Keynote speakers include:
- Professor Swaran Singh - Warwick University
- Dr Eunice Lumsden - Northampton University
- Dr Fiona Warner-Gale – Director, Associate Development Solutions Ltd
- Dr Scott Buckler - Newman University, Birmingham
- Angela Easton - Worcestershire SCB
The mental health of children is becoming more of a complex and challenging issue for practitioners who are recognising that children and young people have to deal with difficulties and issues in their daily lives which can impact on their well-being and welfare, and therefore presents as a critical safeguarding concern.
This one day event is aimed at professionals working across a range of contexts who want to understand more about how they can promote children and young people's mental health and wellbeing and respond more effectively to their needs. Children's families and the role of education are particularly highlighted as being pivotal in terms of access to early help, and a focus is placed on the good practices of child protection and statutory mental health services.
The day will present some challenges about professional responses and debates on how to improve services for children and young people who are experiencing mental health concerns.
Book online at http://www.baspcan.org.uk/booking.php
Invisible Children and Parents: Understanding Suicide and Self-Harm in Work with Vulnerable Clients - Innovative Practice from Barnardo's Safer Futures West
6 November 2015, Novotel, Manchester
The day will be led by Dr Sam Warner, Clinical Supervisor for Barnardo's Safer Futures teams, and Consultant Clinical Psychologist with the Looked-after-Children team.
Keynote speakers include:
- Professor Marcia Worrell, Head of School of Psychology, Social Work and Human Sciences, University of West London
- Lynn Perry, Director of Children's Services Barnardo's West
Plus Children's Service Managers from Barnardo's Safer Futures teams:
- Lynda Regan - child sexual abuse recovery team; Nic Dunn - child sexual exploitation team
- Steve Bore- sexually harmful behaviour team; Abby Ogier - domestic abuse team
Children and young people who self-harm present a major challenge for safeguarding services and numerous serious case reviews have identified many areas for improvement in respect of children and young people who are at risk of suicide. Barnardos' Safer Futures is a long established service in the North West of England that helps children and young people who are involved in risky behaviours move forward to safer lifestyles.
In this conference we draw on the collective experience of Safer Futures to highlight innovative practice in working with children, young people and parents whose risk to themselves is sometimes invisible, very often hidden and too frequently misunderstood. Experts from the fields of child sexual abuse recovery; child sexual exploitation, sexually harmful behaviour, domestic abuse and looked-after-children share their knowledge of current theory, research and personal practice to explain how to support and safeguard children and young people who use self-harm to cope, communicate and/ or as a means to end life.
This day will be relevant to practitioners at all levels, including their supervisors and managers, in all key agencies and organisations working in the safeguarding children arena. This includes practitioners who provide risk assessments, conduct investigations, provide placements or offer support, counselling and therapy.
Book online at http://www.baspcan.org.uk/booking.php
CEN Annual Conference: Wellbeing for Children & Young People with complex and exceptional healthcare needs – adopting the Children & Young People (Scotland) Act
This is the maiden conference of the 
We are delighted to announce that we are now open for nominations for the 2016 Autism Professionals Awards. Last year we had a fantastic selection of entries across all categories, with the judges astounded by the number and quality of the entries.