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A key intandem milestone has been reached! All 13 intandem charities have successfully recruited their new Volunteer Mentor Co-ordinators.

The Co-ordinators are key to the success of intandem and will lead recruiting and training volunteers; building strong links with referral partners; and understanding the needs of young people who are referred and their families.

Having at least one long term relationship with a positive role-model is crucial for all young people; growing and supporting mentoring relationships for the children and young people looked after at home will be a key part of the co-ordinator role.

The next step will be to recruit volunteer mentors and train them so they can make a lasting difference to children and young people who are experiencing extremely difficult circumstances.

Some of Scotland’s most vulnerable young people will be given the chance to build positive, supportive relationships with caring adults thanks to a new fund from Scottish Government and Inspiring Scotland.

The intandem programme will support 13 Scottish charities to mentor children aged 8-14 who live at home and are subject, through the Children’s Hearing system, to local authority supervision. .

intandem was co-created by Scottish Government and Inspiring Scotland and launched by John Swinney, Deputy First Minister and Cabinet Secretary for Education earlier this year. The programme will offer young people a chance to build a relationship with a volunteer adult mentor who will support them as they deal with difficult experiences and challenges.

Existing mentoring projects have demonstrated that the relationship between mentor and young person is extremely valuable. intandem charities will carefully screen and match mentors with mentees based on individual circumstances to best suit the needs of the of the child or young person.

This is the first national programme specifically for children who are looked after at home in Scotland and Inspiring Scotland looks forward to working with the selected charities to improve outcomes for these children and young people.

Minister for Childcare and Early Years, Mark McDonald said:

“The circumstances of children who are looked after by the local authority, but who live at home, are often complex and their access to support services is often limited and inconsistent. These portfolio of charities across Scotland will ensure the needs of children looked after at home are better provided for. We know that having a consistent and positive role model who listens and takes an active interest can prevent our vulnerable children from becoming disengaged. This support will help them move forwards towards realising their full potential.

Celia Tennant, Chief Executive of Inspiring Scotland, said:

The support of a caring adult role-model from outside the family can make an invaluable and lasting difference to children and young people who are experiencing extremely difficult circumstances.

“Inspiring Scotland has been focusing on the issues facing looked after children for some time and we are very pleased that, together with Scottish Government and the 13 charities, we are now able to establish a national mentoring programme to improve the lives of these children and young people.

Jackie Hothersall, chief executive of Befriend a Child, a mentoring charity based in Aberdeen, said:

We are absolutely delighted to be part of the intandem programme. Having the funding and backing of intandem means that we can now give much-needed support, through volunteer mentoring, to children and young people whose lives have been disrupted through their endurance and experience of abuse and neglect.

The resultant complex and challenging behaviours these youngsters can develop has previously stretched our capacity because we haven’t been able to recruit and train volunteers to the level required for this area of work. We will now be able to deliver a new approach in Aberdeen ensuring no children or young person who needs our support will go without.

The difficult situations faced by children looked after at home can lead to lower school attendance and to poorer general and mental health, which can have lasting impact on their lives.

Existing mentoring projects have demonstrated that the relationship between mentor and young person is extremely valuable.

The initial phase of intandem will focus on children who are looked after by the local authority and who live at home supporting hundreds of young people between the ages of 8-14 over the next two and a half years.

After a rigorous three-month selection process, 13 charities have been invited to form the initial intandem portfolio. The intandem portfolio of charities ranges from large national organisations to smaller charities operating within a single local authority or town. They bring a range of experience of mentoring, delivering through volunteers and working with vulnerable children and young people.

Inspiring Scotland will begin to work with the charities immediately to recruit an intandem volunteer co-ordinator who will then recruit, select and train volunteer mentors.

Applications are now open for a programme designed to match positive role models with children in care, launched by John Swinney, Deputy First Minister and Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills. [Read more…] about Deputy First Minister launches intandem mentoring scheme

intandem, Scotland’s mentoring programme for young people looked after at home is being officially launched by John Swinney on 28th July.

Inspiring Scotland is leading the development of Scottish Government’s programme, initially for children and young people who are looked after at home.

About the Programme
intandem will initially support young people aged between 8-14 years who are looked after by their local authority and living at home. The programme recognises a young person’s need to have at least one long term relationship with a positive adult role-model. The disruption children face leading up to and on coming into the care system can make this difficult to achieve within a family setting.

Young people who choose to take part in the scheme will be carefully matched with a trained volunteer and together they will build a positive, trusting, supportive and secure relationship. Effective mentoring relationships have been shown to be long term, frequent and regular.

The quality of the programme will be critically important. For example, organisations which receive funding will be expected to have achieved or to work towards the attainment of either the Befriending Networks’ Quality in Befriending Award or the Scottish Mentoring Network’s Quality Award.

Funded organisations will receive on-going support from intandem and Inspiring Scotland across a range of issues, such as volunteer recruitment and training, and capacity building. They will also have the opportunity to take part in co-designing approaches to evaluation, and will be expected to take part in agreed evaluation and reporting processes, overseen by Inspiring Scotland.
Eligibility for Funding
OSCR registered organisations interested in applying for funding to support 8-14 year olds who are looked after at home will be encouraged to apply for funding through Inspiring Scotland later this summer. Organisations should consider now what new mentoring support they can offer this group.

Whilst the term mentoring is used to describe the programme because the relationship is intended to have a goal orientation, it is recognised that many organisations deliver this to children and young people within a befriending service.

Applications are therefore encouraged from voluntary organisations with experience of at least one of the following:

• Providing mentoring or befriending services
• Working with vulnerable or looked after children and young people
• Providing one to one support to individual children

Inspiring Scotland has been working with BOLD, Scotland’s only social enterprise advertising and branding agency to develop the logo and branding. The process was co-created with young people and representatives of organisations who mentor and befriend young people.