Alcohol & Substance Abuse

I've tried to gather some relevant resources here, for those of you writing on this topic. As a starting point, the World Health Organization's website has a dedicated page containing a range of resources, which include publications including:

• The health and social effects of nonmedical cannabis use
• Community management of opioid overdose
• Global strategy to reduce the harmful use of alcohol
• This article explores the impact that alcohol consumption can have on young people. 

Numerous Government publications have been produced, here are the most current. There are several organisations that regularly publish research in this area: the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction (EMCDDA) provide current overviews of drug problems in Europe - the United Kingdom Drug Situation report is a publication submitted to the EMCDDA annually; Public Health England provides a list of articles, publications and statistics; the ONS have datasets on drug misuse and drinking habits in Great Britain; statistics have also been made available by the HSCIC on drugs misuse and alcohol abuse. 

The following related books are available in the library:

• Substance misuse : the implications of research, policy and practice - 362.29 BAR
• A-Z of substance misuse & drug addiction - 362.29 MAC 
• Understanding & working with substance misusers - 362.29 PYC 
• Drugs - 362.290941 ACR (Available in E-Resources: Isssues Online)
• Motivational interviewing and stages of change : integrating best practices for substance abuse professionals - 362.291 TOM 
• Getting wise to drugs - 372.37044 EMM 
• Emerging perspectives on substance misuse - 616.86 MIS 
• Applied cognitive and behavioural approaches to the treatment of addiction - 616.86 MIT 
• Theory of addiction - 616.86 WES 

In E-Resources (portal), try individual searches in CareKnowledge, SocIndex and Issues Online.

Hope this helps! If you do require anything further information, please contact 

Manjeet Dhillon.

Children’s Centre Census 2015

The Children’s Centre Census 2015 has been published by 4Children; it provides an overview of the major trends and developments taking place in Children’s Centres across the country. This year the Census received responses from nearly 400 Centre managers, collectively responsible for approximately 1,000 Children’s Centre sites nationwide.

While you were away....

Over the summer, there have been a number of changes in the early years and childcare arena - here goes!

Back in June, The government introduced the Childcare Bill to bring in 30 hours of free childcare for employed families of 3 and 4 year olds. Plans are being drawn up to introduce the changes for some families a year earlier than planned, with pilots in some areas offering 30 hours worth of free places from September 2016. The DfE has announced a call for early implementers to pilot the scheme; organisations who would like to register their interest can do so by emailing the DfE here by Monday 28th September.

The new Common Inspection Framework came into effect on the 1st of September. Ofsted has published the first edition of the Early Years Inspection Update newsletter which provides key messages, relevant publications and updates to inspection documentation.

A new report from the Study of Early Education and Development (SEED) study has been published which highlights the key factors distinguishing the quality of care provided by childminders.

Ofsted has published its annual report for the early years. Accompanying the report is a detailed survey exploring teaching and play in the early years which includes links to videos of good practice and detailed exemplification. Also by Ofsted are published statistics on childcare inspections and outcomes covering childcare in England. 

Child Health Profiles

Public Health England have published this year's Child Health Profile, providing analysis and key findings for each top level local authority in England. Updated annually, these provide a snapshot of performance against 32 selected indicators compared with the rest of England. The profiles are designed to help local authorities and health services improve the health and well-being of children and to tackle health inequalities. 

Young Offenders

There has been much discussion in the news recently about cared for young offenders. Government figures show that the  majority  of young people are in care because they have suffered abuse or neglect - just 2% of them are taken into care primarily because of their own socially unacceptable behaviour. However, a disproportionate number of them are more likely to end up in the criminal justice system than other children. The issues behind this will now be examined in an independent review, to be chaired by Lord Laming.

The latest 'Proven Re-offending' statistics bulletin from the Ministry of Justice is now available, giving figures for adult and youth re-offenders; it also looks at some of the underlying reasons for young people re-offending. NACRO are a crime reduction charity, aiming to reduce crime and re-offending in communities across England and Wales, by offering programmes that help people back into work. 

Amongst their publications is one that offers advice on employing ex-offenders.

Ready for work....

A number of SEN resources are available for young people requiring support to help them into work: as part of their Preparation for Adulthood programme, 'Preparing for Adulthood' have published two new case studies to support young people with mental health issues. 

Supported internships are study programmes that take place in both work and college so that learners receive practical hands-on experience; useful information on supported internships, who offers these programmes, setting them up and funding issues are provided in this factsheet. The number of study programmes available to 16-25 year old students with learning difficulties and/or disabilities are becoming more widely available; further information on study programmes can be found here.

From the DfE, the latest SEN statistics and analysis have been published on local authorities’ progress in transferring to the new system of Education, Health and Care (EHC) plans.

Update: School Inspection

The March edition of the School Inspection Update has been published, discussing inspection of school and academy sixth forms; there are various links within the document for further reading and statistics on topics such as online safety, teaching assistants, workload, performance tables and more. Handbooks for school inspectors can be found here.

C ... is for Childlink

If you're not yet familiar with Childlink, here's an introduction - it is an online resource designed to give current articles, reports, research and statistics on education, employment, health, lifestyle, welfare and youth issues. Childlink can be found in the 'E-Resources' list on the Library page of the Portal. A number of Study Guides show how Childlink can be used as a useful study and teaching tool across various courses.

Register for free and receive their weekly update by email.