ALPHA the FAMILY and INTER-AGENCY WORKING

A. The School – Family – Social Work – Educational Psychology Seminar

We operate a system of collaborative seminars designed to promote the vital role played by a pupil’s family, Social Worker and Educational Psychologist in their ongoing progress. Whenever a pupil has undergone an educational or psychological assessment that provides new information resulting in adjustment of educational or psychology programmes, their family, Social Worker and Educational Psychologist are invited to participate in a training seminar. This seminar conveys new knowledge, demonstrates how to use this knowledge to support the pupil’s educational and psychological growth, and provides training in any new educational and/or psychological methods.

B. Family-Sensitive Approach - Parenting Skills Assessment - Family Therapy – Parenting Classes

We recognise the importance of family to the pupil and are committed to the ongoing support and education of our pupil’s families. In order to promote good parenting practice our psychology department can assess the parenting skills of our pupil’s parents, provide parents with a profile of their individual strengths and weaknesses and offer guidance and support to help them further improve their parenting skills.

Whenever appropriate we also offer families a 10-session block of family therapy. * Our family therapy model views the family as the child’s primary support system, and the family is encouraged to actively participate in the decision-making and planning processes. This includes implementation, monitoring, evaluation and the adaptation of therapy goals to the family’s individual needs. The family therapy model’s three intervention phases are as follows:

Phase 1: Engagement and motivation Phase 2: Behavioural change Phase 3: Generalising positive changes to the pupil’s home situation, as part of a planned return to the family home.

*Additional sessions can be provided in agreement with referring agencies. Furthermore, if two or more pupils are from the same family they are eligible for 10 additional sessions per pupil. For instance 2 siblings receive 20 sessions.