PINE seeks to help children’s social work services build up evidence of programmes that are working well in practice, to help understand what makes them successful and make them sustainable and scalable moving forward.

Councillor Jackie Smith, Cabinet Member for Children’s Services and Community Safety said: “We are delighted to be working with the What Works Centre for Children’s Social Care on this important project, as supporting social workers in their continuing professional development and well-being will encourage staff in our borough and improve outcomes for our children.”

In 2018, Royal Greenwich Children’s Services were selected to be one of the Pioneer Partners for the What Works Centre, and have worked with them to develop tools to assess whether organisations are evidence minded. We are also one of 26 local authorities who are participating in their first set of behavioural interventions investigating ways to improve social worker wellbeing.  

What Works Centre for Children’s Social Care said: “The Royal Borough of Greenwich’s evaluation is important because it speaks to how we embed learning in practice, which is crucial to our mission. They are embarking on an exciting new approach to learning and development through thematic practice weeks and we will be working alongside them to help evaluate how they impact on social worker skills and confidence as well as outcomes for children and families.”

About What Works Centre for Children’s Social Care

The What Works Centre for Children’s Social Care is an initiative to foster evidence-informed practice in England. Sir Alan Wood has been appointed as the Founding Chair to lead the work of the Centre. The What Works Centre for Children’s Social Care seeks to explore how practitioners at different levels view, access and use evidence in their work and also to develop insights into the kinds of interventions already being used to improve outcomes for children, families and staff, and to explore new ideas that could be tested.