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Parents and Providers Forum

The aims of the project are:

Participation To engage with parents and carers who are excluded or underrepresented To assist parents and cares in accessing the support and information they need To enable parents and carers have their say on future services

Provision To ensure that services reflect the needs of parents and carers To identify gaps in service To ensure services are inclusive

Positive Change To build confidence and motivation To breakdown barriers To identify opportunities for parents and carers

The underlying philosophy of the project is to work with local parents, to ensure that people know where and how to access the support they may need: that with appropriate support the challenge of becoming a new parent is seen as an opportunity for positive change.

This includes identifying possible return to work routes available to parents with young children, managing a change in career path and/or help with accessing paid employment.

Working in partnership with parents and other agencies e will offer support to overcome language and cultural barriers, post natal depression, or feelings of inadequacy and lack of confidence or motivation.

The outcome of the project is to establish a Waterloo Parent’s & Provider’s Forum, developing a common understanding of needs and opportunities, and helping fashion current services and initiate new services/activities for parents and young families.

This is an exciting project that will work with both parents and providers in addressing issues of poverty & exclusion that occur in Lambeth/Southwark.

The Forum will help increase access to existing opportunities and services and help those opportunities become better known to less advantaged parents.

This will be in respect of child care and parenting skills and for gaining work place related skills and job opportunities. The Forum will support training and development within the local community of parents and assist parents to engage positively with the whole range of regeneration opportunities in Waterloo.

The Forum will help identify unmet needs and ways of addressing those needs including maximising the use of and improving co-ordination between existing services/ activities, as well as proposals for new services and facilities needed in the area.

The Forum would develop from two initial aspects:

1. Parents Network, with a specific point of contact/ base, providing:

The means for local parents and carers to pool their skills, knowledge and time
Events and activities as means to consult with local parents to ensure inclusion in local development and regeneration projects
Training for local parents to enable them to participate more effectively in civic life, to access appropriate services more easily, to meet other young parents in the area, to share knowledge of parenting skills, and to create confidence
A monthly newsletter/ website (or other means of communicating local activity) covering Mon-Sun activities/services for young families in Waterloo
An opportunity for parent participation in project development, mother and baby groups, and a Healthy Start Clinic service in Waterloo through liaison with the Primary Care Trust and local health services.

2. Providers Strategic Partnership:

Bring together statutory, private and voluntary sector to enable better engagement between sectors
Share knowledge, best practise, planning
Forge new partnerships and develop existing links
Consider provision strategically and holistically to impact upon decisions and delivery
Develop new ways of working with customers through the Parent’s Network
Support and progress specific projects, presenting opportunities for making collective bids for identified gaps in services.

Our Mission is that Waterloo Parent and Carers Network will provide a hub, that has gathered together information for parents on local services, web sites, articles, information on support agencies and much more.

It will also offer an opportunity for parents to come together and share their experiences, skills and knowledge. We believe that working together we can remove the barriers that prevent people from using services and create positive change for all.