Inaura rolls out 'education with family hosting'

Living, learning and belonging in the Inaura Community
Personalised special Education with family placement programmes provided by Inaura the inclusion charity

• A registered charity (No. 1092152)
• A registered independent special school (DCSF 933/6000)
• A registered independent fostering agency (OfSted SC370377)

Inaura the inclusion charity was established in 2001 through three successive DCSF grants to develop innovative organisational and professional approaches which would promote inclusion. Since then we have been developing services for children with high levels of additional need through our school and fostering agency.

In 2007 Inaura merged with another registered charity Choices for You. We have six trustees, including a clinical psychologist and an Ofsted inspector.  Our staff team includes in-house psychologist, play therapist, CB Therapist, specialist teachers, mentors and instructors, and an efficient executive team, including a registered manager with more than 30 years experience in residential care.

"the Department continues to hold Inaura in great regard. The work you do is extremely valuable and we wish you every success going forward". “DCSF commendation 2006 ”

The Inaura Community

• Belonging
  An including network of up to 25 young people (aged 10-16) with their carers their personal network of support a team of trained and dedicated professionals
• Learning
  All our young people will have personalised education programmes with full 1:1 support
• Living
  About half will be fostered through Inaura

We train all staff, carers and young people to use a relational approach to promote the development of positive, co-operative relationships and secure attachments.

Our Education with foster-care programmes

Inaura offers young people with additional and special education needs who need to be accommodated a seamless and integrated package for living and learning provided by our school and our fostering agency.

• There are many synergies when one organisation is managing both social care and education. Administration, Communications Support and Management can be combined.
• Staff and carers can easily work across the home-school boundary.

Planned

• More people are available to provide additional support and facilitation
• For instance, a foster-carer who has formed a secure attachment with a young person might come into the school to provide additional support,
• An education mentor with whom a young person has bonded well may take them out several times a week from the foster-home and spend time with both carer and young person facilitating the development of effective boundaries in the home.

Crisis management

• When difficulties arise these are often short-term and resolvable but are highly stressful for an unsupported foster-carer
• More people are available to share the problems and find the best solutions.

The Inaura Community is an including network of up to 25 young people (aged 10-16) with their carers, their personal network of support, and a team of trained and dedicated professionals. We train all staff, carers and young people to use a relational approach to promote the development of positive, co-operative relationships and secure attachments.

Why our family accommodation is successful

Our foster-carers and support team are trained to promote co-operative relationships and positive attachments with children aged 10 – 18.
The strengths and resilience of our community reflect the strengths and resilience of these relationships.
Our foster-carers and children meet regularly, become friends, and support each other.
Everyone is trained to use a consistent and proven relational approach.

Our managers are all trained therapists who work therapeutically with our children

Through our community ethos and network of relationships:

• problems are shared
• The human scale of our community (no more than about 60 children and adults) makes it easier to provide ‘direct support now’:
• therapeutic AND support needs are provided for directly and immediately as a matter of course
• relationships of support extend responsibility beyond the foster-carers to the whole team
• our foster-carers do not feel isolated

Our young people have a choice in whether they join our community. Whenever possible we go on giving them choices about how they engage with it and encourage friendships between our foster children. Children who are more settled support those who are new to the community through our youth participation forum.

Our foster carers are very carefully selected for their personal strengths and their suitable for fostering (We accept about 5% of applicants for training and approval).

Our therapeutic and support team regularly and frequently provide psychology input, holistic therapy, additional activities, respite, planned intervention and crisis management.

Our professional development programme enables staff to pool their understanding and experience to achieve positive outcomes and enable the development of secure attachments between our young people and their foster carers.