Young People's Organising and Campaigning group

The Young People's Organising and Campaigning (YPOC) Group is a group of young people, aged 12 and over, who are, or have been, looked after away from home. The group meets monthly and is open to any young person who wants to come along.

The YPOC group gives you the opportunity to share your views and experiences of being looked after so we, and our partner agencies, can then improve our services for children and young people.

The group also looks for ways to help more young people have a voice, campaigning and highlighting the issues that affect you.

The YPOC group takes part in:

• Campaigns to improve the lives of other care experienced young people
• Talking to our corporate parents, including councillors, social workers, carers, education staff, health staff and a range of other professionals involved in supporting care experienced young people about what would improve things
• Training events for the adults involved in your care
• Tell it like it is events

The Children's Rights Service is also helping the YPOC group to link into the formal structures of the council.

The YPOC group have written and produced guides and DVDs about:

• Making meetings better
• Corporate parenting guide
• Supporting looked after young people in school guide
• Coming into care and moving placement

Making meetings better

The YPOC group have written and produced a guide to meetings booklet and DVD.

The guide is for the adults who come along to looked after young people’s meetings. It tells them what would help children and young people to take part more fully in their meetings and what the adults can do to support them

Read the making meetings better guide (PDF 466KB).

Corporate parenting guide

The YPOC group has also designed a guide and DVD called “We Are the Bairns". It is about corporate parenting from the perspective of looked after children and young people.

This guide is for anyone who is involved with the care of looked after children, so that everyone with a corporate parent role knows what young people expect of them.

Read the corporate parenting guide (PDF 887KB).

Supporting looked after young people in school guide

The YPOC group created the “don't judge, we're no different from you” guide and DVD to improve the experience of looked after children in school.

This guide is aimed at corporate parents in education and school management to get them to understand that school is important for care experienced young people and that if you can do well at school, you can do well in life. It helps teachers and support staff to know the challenges that you might be facing and how it will affect your ability to learn.

It is also important for other pupils to understand what it's like to be in care and that you are not in care because you have done something bad.

Read the supporting looked after young people in school guide (PDF 393KB) or watch the supporting looked after young people in school video (16 minutes).

Coming into care and moving placements – Getting it right

This YPOC Group’s campaign is about coming into care and moving placement and gives guidance to the adults involved in supporting children and young people at this time. It tells these adults what they can do to make things easier for children and young people going through this experience.

The YPOC group drew on their own experiences and also surveyed other care experienced children and young people, to create a guide and a DVD which they hope will improve the experience for children who come into care or move placement in future.

Read the coming into care and moving placements guide (PDF 542KB) or watch the coming into care and moving placements video (9 minutes).