The question was "What is the most effective young person/child ratio to child and youth care worker and working hours to optimise child care services without abusing or burning them out ?"
The intention to protect child and youth care workers and so to ensure more efficient and effective care for children without crippling the professional is to be praised.
The response however, is sure to be emotionally loaded in any organisation where caring is its core business. There is no 'one off, pat' answer.
In 1982/3 the apartheid government instructed that an enquiry be undertaken and these same issues be assessed in the Children's Homes. The deMeyer Commission Report was tabled and circularised. The report made very unambiguous recommendations
In the first instance it read that dormitory- styled Children's Homes should have no more than 60 children in total. It resulted in the 200 - 300 bed facilities for white children being closed. The "small is beautiful" concept in child and youth care work took root. Some Children's Homes with large campuses and many buildings experienced problems as the Department of Welfare reduced the placements. The grounds and the buildings could not be maintained with the reduced income from government per-capita (heads on beds) funding.
The ratio of child and youth care workers to young people, it read , should be 1/8 and 1/4 for the more troubled and or difficult to manage young people.
The deMeyer Commission Report (1982/1983) raised considerable anger in the child care sector which catered for the apartheid Black, Indian or "Coloured" children particularly as they were financed by separate apartheid state departments. Certainly in 1994?1995 those recommendations were no where near being implemented in the so called "Black" children's facilities. This was made very clear to the new democratic government in the massive criticism and concern made by the President Nelson Mandela 'Cabinet Enquiry into Places of Safety and Detention'. Ratios were anywhere up to 1/50 !! Requiring that security guards be employed, some with dogs and some in towers with guns.
In the so,called "White" sector following deMeyer there was a gradual emergence toward Village and Group Home settings where the smaller numbers were accommodated more appropriately and staff ratios changed. In the then Transvaal Province, the Department became comfortable with 1/12 or 1/13 for less troubling children, moving closer to normalisation and the deMeyer Report recommendations.
In 1995/6/7, young people were no longer, by law to be in prisons. The trickle down, no, the more like a flood of less manageable young people were taken into the child and youth care system. It meant that staff ratios took something of a bump as the released young people were placed in dormitory systems as in Places of Safety and what became known as Child and Youth Care Centres. Children's Homes became regarded more as short term Treatment Centres requiring reduced staff ratios. There was though, a core of residential child and youth care staff on 24/7 duty. The changes sped up the education and training of child and youth care workers.
Child and youth care practice became more professionally "treatment" orientated. With exceptions, in the Children's Homes, 1/12 or 1/15 became more of a norm.
The 1997, transformation of the Child and Youth Care System in South Africa. provided regulation (and later legal) norms and standards. A requirement was, and is, nationally and locally in-house, that there be a 'continuum"and "continuity of care" in a range from "most restrictive, least empowering" to "least restrictive, most empowering" A continuum at levels from adoptions and foster care to what was then called Child and Youth Care Centres for young people in trouble with the law...awaiting trial or sentenced young people. It means that child and youth care worker to young people ratios are to fit the level of manageabilty and intensity of practical, effective intervention that the young person needs.
The principles in the National system apply also in any one Child and Youth Care facility. Staff ratios and levels of care are to vary according to the need levels of the children and young people. A few. in my experience, even in the Children's Homes needed an allocation of 1/2,especially children with challenges, disability, severely traumatised, disabled, suicidal,... the list continues. Others were fine with 1/8 and in some instances, the less troubled, troubling young people 1/12. Toddlers needed about 1/5.
A "one size fits all"approach in any aspects of a programme is a concern. It is said that Child and Youth Care must meet the developmental needs of "This child" and not " These" or "Those" children. It must be individualised. It complicates things but it is a measure of the quality of Child and Youth Care services and professional practice. This impacts on child and youth care worker/children ratios especially at critical times in the day/programme.
Child and Youth Care in the move to professionalisation shifted toward having child and youth care workers in shifts. The law determines that employees work a 40 hour week. I found that if there was a "live in" system, it had to be carefully augmented (supported) by 'live out"shift workers. this allowed for more fairness on the live-n staff who were not then 24/7. TOIL or 'time of in lieu" was used when longer hours were worked and if called out when "on call".
Scheduling has to include time off to be taken which allows a fair distribution of weekends off.
The complications of scheduling, fairness and hours of duty are clear. There appears to be a few configurations for shifts. The 12 hour shift 4 days on, 3 days off alternate weeks day and night shift. The child and youth care workers complain that the 12 hour shift ( 06.00 to 18.00hrs) fatigued them to a point where they can't give of their best throughout. 8 hour shifts appear to be favoured. Then there is always debate as to whether a child and youth care worker can sleep when on a night shift. An awake child and youth care worker can probably manage say, 30 young people with the live-in member on call when he/she is not days off.
Staff patterns to meet the Conditions of Employment Act and the differing levels of need of young people in any one setting requires increased funding creative scheduling and operational Child and Youth Care planning
The organisation/facility has a duty, and responsibility to do this in the best interests of the child with due regard for the professional effectiveness of the child and youth care worker.
I want to say that it is a juggling act of sorts but a juggling act in which we have to keep all the different coloured balls in the air. The best intention is rewarded through carefully thought out and considerate planning. It's a challenge worth the effort.
No comments:
Post a Comment