About Us

CLICK
Chidlren Living In Care Kouncil
Who we are
We are a group of young people that are or have been in care. We try to make sure that we change what social services (now children's specialist services) are doing wrong and to improve what they are doing right. Also, when they want to change how they look after us, we want to be involved in how they do it or give our opinion and ideas if we don't like it.
This means that we meet up with managers and other young people who are always making decisions that affect YOUR lives and you are entitled too.
We say that social workers shouldn't make decisions without talking to us first thats why we want to talk to as many of you as possible and get you involved in things that are affecting all our lives.
Why we are here
- to have some influence over our own lives
- to change the way we are seen and treated
- to get the views, opinions and ideas of other children and young people looked after, heard by Wandsworth and to make change happen
- to have some fun!
How we started
Since December 2007, seven of us started working to create a Children in Care Council for Wandsworth, with the purpose to highlight how young people can be involved in making decisions with professionals.
As young people, we got together and tossed a few ideas around as to what we would want a Care Council to look like and how it was to function. Our primary aim was to advocate for young people looked after, who might not know or want to speak up if there were things concerning them.
We met with Cllr Tracey and Jack Cordery to express our ideas and get their feedback and support. We also visited the Council Chambers.
We then held an open meeting for any interested Wandsworth staff working with young people to come along to.
This resulted in a regular joint monthly meeting to discuss how to launch the council and issues that were important to us. These meetings were very successful. We think the adults enjoy our icebreakers and refreshments we provide in a relaxed but fun environment! It was here that we came up wth the name CLICK to stand for Children Living in Care Kouncil (Council with a K!).
Our launch
In Novemeber 2008, we organised a launch event to highlight to other young people what CLICK was about. The event was held at Tooting Hub and we had loads going on including manga artists, chelsea footballers, face painting and a load of prizes to give away.
The day was a great success and lots of young people expressed their interest to join. As a result we recruited 4 more members who wanted to come along to meetings and lots of other young people who wanted to be involved in different ways.
Our progress during 2009
During 2009, we managed to do and achieve a lot in a short space of time. Too numerous to mention here in lots of depth, we can give you a taster of some of the things we got up to:
- a residential weekend in Wales (mud angels, climbing walls, food fights!)
- a visit to the BBC studios to advise writers about Tracey Beaker and the reality of what it is really like living in a 'dumping ground'.
- designed a questionnaire for children looked after to gather information from them about stuff they would like to see changed
- involvement in pushing forward the Corporate Parenting agend in Wandsworth. Presenting at three events to highlight to Members and staff their role as corporate parents.
- Involvement in Total Respect Training where we trained staff from across the Council.
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