School-Home Support Practitioner Service
Overview
What?
Expert pastoral practitioners who work directly with pupils and their families to improve school attendance, behaviour, and engagement in learning.
Where?
Practitioners can be based in schools, nurseries, alternative provision settings, pupil referral units, multi-academy trusts, and local authorities – but the service is fully managed by School-Home Support, from recruitment to supervision, through to impact measurement and setting-specific annual reports.
Who?
Practitioners come from a range of specialist backgrounds including teaching, healthcare, youth work, social work, special educational needs, etc. Working for School-Home Support means their roles are not limited to one area of delivery, but rather we address all the issues a pupil and their family present.
How?
Our practitioner service is flexible so that we can tailor and adapt it to the specific needs of your setting. The way our practitioners work is also highly flexible and interventions are not time-limited as every family is different. We work with them to assess their needs and co-produce a personalised plan that will increase their resilience and independence. To see how we work with disadvantaged pupils and their families, click here.
Why School-Home Support?
We’ve worked in school settings with pupils, parents and teachers for over 35 years. We know the importance of supporting the whole family beyond the classroom to get children in school and ready to learn. We are national leaders in raising the attendance, behaviour, and engagement of the most disadvantaged pupils in England.
Our impact
63% of the children we supported in 2021/22 improved their attendance.
The average attendance improvement = 7.8%.
This equates to 15 more days in school.
A service to suit your needs
Here is an overview of our practitioner services, intended to meet your varying requirements.
One of the team will visit to discuss your current challenges and tailor the recruitment specifically to the needs of your educational setting.
General Practitioners
Staff based in schools who carry out the family support function with a focus on:
- Increasing attendance with targeted family support and/or
- Improving parental engagement with coffee mornings and/or workshops.
Specialist Practitioners
Carry out specific roles, such as:
- Transition support: staff working specifically to support the difficulties some children and families experience when transitioning from Years 6 to 7.
- Special Educational Needs (SEN) support: staff working to ensure families of those identified with SEN receive dedicated support with Education Health Care plans and signposting for appropriate services to meet individual needs.
High-Intensity Practitioners
Carry out a more intensive role in providing casework support to a smaller number of families, such as:
- Safeguarding: staff dedicated to supporting the increased safeguarding demands of schools and the complex needs of some families today.
- Alternative Provision Support: staff based in a small setting, providing intensive support to students and families with complex needs, including mental health concerns and addiction.
Get in touch to learn more about how an School-Home Support Practitioner can support pupils and staff in your setting.
School-Home Support Practitioner Service: Added benefits
School-Home Support Welfare Fund
Many of the children and families we support live in poverty and struggle to buy essential items. The School-Home Support Welfare Fund is a vital part of our toolkit for practitioners, giving them the means to apply for grants on behalf of children and their families and provide the practical support needed to overcome barriers to education.
The funds are kindly donated to School-Home Support from our generous supporters.
In addition to getting children and parents through challenging times, the Welfare Fund can also help them to build a trusting relationship with their practitioner and escape a cycle of negativity when they see that positive outcomes can happen for them.
A grant from the School-Home Support Welfare Fund can make the difference between a child being in school and ready to learn, or missing school and thus falling behind in their education. The latter has damaging consequences for their life prospects.
This is only available to schools with the School-Home Support Practitioner service.
Learn more Enquire here
See the impact through our case studies
Value from the world of work
Raising aspirations
Our Aspiration Sessions are hugely impactful in helping pupils and their parents to aim higher, work harder, and believe that the possibilities are there for them. Employees from SHS corporate partnerships volunteer and spend time with children and their families at their offices (usually a city firm) giving them an authentic insight into the world of work and providing inspiration for future careers.
Read about past Aspiration Sessions
Support with employment
Staff from our corporate partners also come out to local schools and help parents and carers around employment. Parents taking part in our CV and Employment Skills Workshops, leave with a CV they feel proud of, better interview skills and increased confidence.
Read about past Employment Skills Workshops