Inspectors praise 'outstanding' Hassockfield resettlement work

Resettlement activity at the Durham STC was graded as outstanding by inspectors, following their unannounced visit in September.

They were impressed that work to plan for the release of the 12- to 18-year-old boys and girls at the STC started as soon as they were admitted.

Inspectors also found assessments of their educational and health needs were thorough, regularly updated and completed by named caseworkers to create "bespoke" programmes to reduce offending after release.

Involvement of parents, community youth offending teams and particularly social workers in resettlement work was also praised.

At the time of the inspection, 14 young offenders, a third of the total population, were looked-after children.

In their report, inspectors say: “The standard of communication between centre staff and external professional staff and family members is excellent."

A social worker told inspectors that Hassockfield’s resettlement team gave them weekly email updates on young offenders’ behaviour and called them on the phone swiftly if a new issue arose.

Young offender involvement in their resettlement was also praised, especially the use of individual and group sessions to discuss their progress and plans for the future.

Parents of young offenders were also impressed with the STC's work. One told inspectors that staff had “bent over backwards to organise contact” and “couldn’t have done anything more” to support family relationships.

In terms of overall effectiveness and the other four graded areas of safety, behaviour, wellbeing and achievement of young people, Hassockfield was rated as "good" by inspectors.

Staff training, performance management and tackling poor behaviour were other areas that impressed Ofsted.

However, inspectors want to see improvements in how young people’s complaints are dealt with, to ensure responses are written in plain English and include information about the appeals process.