Scope - Redcar and Cleveland
Key Facts
Location
Project Criteria
Project funding
£73,126
Funding round
Set up in 1953 Scope is a leading national disability charity working to ensure that disabled people are valued equally and have the same opportunities as non-disabled people. We take a life long learning approach that supports the development of disabled people throughout their lives. This includes Early Years work, supporting disabled children in mainstream education and life and work based skills development for adults. We also run residential services and campaign to overcome prejudice against people with a disability.
In Redcar and Cleveland we are using the Parenting Fund grant to establish the 'Face to Face' parent to parent support scheme. Parents of children with disabilities will be recruited and trained to offer emotional support to parents of children newly diagnosed with a disability. The scheme is part of the national Face 2 Face network, a service supported by Scope. Further information on Face 2 Face is available via their website www.face2facenetwork.org.uk.
We expect to:
- give parents the emotional strength and confidence to manage their own and their family's situation
- ensure that all parents who have children recently diagnosed with a disability receive befriending support that helps them overcome feelings of isolation. This includes fathers and those from black and ethnic minority, and other hard to reach groups
- encourage all parents of disabled children to have realistic and positive expectations of their children
- enable children to develop to their full potential in a relaxed, happy and supportive family environment
- promote the long term benefits that are derived from the empathetic presence of a parent who has personal experience of disability with their own child
- inform and educate parents and service providers about the complex issues surrounding the emotional needs of a recent diagnosis of disability
- build partnerships with statutory and voluntary agencies so that Face 2 Face becomes an integral part of mainstream service delivery
- build on Scope's success in influencing service delivery at national and local level.