Letters to the Editor: Internship programme targets charity sector

Young people often find themselves caught in a cycle of not being able to get a job because they don't have experience and not being able to get experience because they can't get a job. It was therefore good to read about creating paid internships at Youth Music (Creating paid internships, CYP Now, August).

The Jack Petchey Foundation agrees that unpaid internships create barriers to young people starting and progressing in charity sector careers. At the same time, we know youth charities often have lots more work they could do, but struggle to find the funds to create additional staff resource. That's why we created the Jack Petchey Internship Programme whereby we enable youth charities to employ an intern for one year on the real living wage.

Each intern receives a £1,000 personal training budget and joins a personal development programme, including support from a mentor, to ensure they get the most from their paid work experience year. This way, talented young people can gain a head start in the youth sector and have a real impact on the organisations they work in.

This year will see 20 more youth charities gain from the new programme. By funding internships, mentoring and training, we aim to have a positive impact not only on the interns themselves, but on the wider youth sector, and on the young people they support.

Trudy Kilcullen, chief executive, Jack Petchey Foundation

Ditching individual education plans was wrong

It is worth noting that the government - taking advice from Ofsted - decided in 2014 to remove the requirement for many children now "categorised" as requiring SEN support to have individual education plans (IEPs) (Support mainstream SEN inclusion, urges ADCS, cypnow.co.uk, 7 August). IEPs were considered to be ineffective because they did not lead to an improvement in outcomes for young people.

However, good IEPs had a positive impact and provided an important basis for discussion between schools and families. They contributed to developing parental confidence and provided an important and transparent measure of accountability. By ditching IEPs, on the basis of equivocal evidence, the baby was thrown out with the bath water.

The Department for Education, particularly under Michael Gove and Nicky Morgan, actively stripped out experienced and skilled SEND leadership in many local authority areas. This, I think, led directly to strategic drift, with many authorities simply not providing leadership on inclusive and special education that schools and families expected as new legislation (the Children and Families Act 2014) was introduced.

Alongside this, the rapid advancement of academisation as a national policy marginalised SEND policy and made it hard for councils to carry out their statutory duties in accord with the Act.

We are in a position where half of authorities/areas are assessed as having serious weaknesses with regard to implementing the 2014 Act and in some instances, these weaknesses continue despite "re-visits" by the joint inspectorate.

Christopher Robertson

Secure emotional base helps children flourish

The theory of child care is attachment. The theory of social work is relationships. This report shows this as rhetoric (Stability Index reveals ‘explosion' in number of older children in care, cypnow.co.uk, 1 August).

The reality of the care system is the making and breaking of relationships. A secure emotional base is the foundation for stability and growth. There is much talk of individual outcomes. The report shows how these are subverted when the system becomes a sequence of care packages by a scatter of intermittent interested parties.

We need to start our work for each child creating the facilitating environment for each child uniquely. This is skilled work requiring investment financially, professionally and personally. It is the task of any government to ensure the conditions exist for all children.

Currently, we have many spending commitments being made. A secure emotional base isn't a catchy soundbite, but you flourish when you've got it, and are disadvantaged when you haven't. It's not even a choice - it's a must.

Jonathan Stanley, National Centre for Excellence in Residential Child Care