Who is a Young Carer?
Young carers are children and young people who provide care to another family member. The level of care they provide would usually be undertaken by an adult and as a result of this they take on a level of responsibility that is inappropriate to their age and development. This is likely to have a significant impact on their childhood experiences.
The person they look after will have one or more of the following:
- Physical disability
- Sensory disability
- Learning disability
- Mental health problem
- Chronic illness
- Substance misuse problem
Caring Tasks:
A young carer will take on additional responsibilities to those appropriate to their age and development. A young carer might be providing the main care or share responsibilities with another family member. The caring tasks that a young carer has to deal with can range from:
Nursing care: giving medication, injections, changing dressings, assisting with
mobility etc.
Personal intimate care: washing, dressing, feeding and helping with toilet requirements.
Emotional care: being compliant, monitoring the emotional state of the person cared for, listening, being a shoulder to cry on, supporting a parent through depression and trying to cheer them up. In cases where a young carer is supporting an adult with drug/alcohol misuse problem, they will often take a leading role in trying to keep that person safe.
Domestic care: doing a substantial amount of housework, cooking, shopping, cleaning, laundry etc.
Financial care: running the household, bill paying, benefit collection etc.
Child care: taking responsibility for younger siblings in addition to their other caring responsibilities.
Communication& Interpreting: communicating on behalf of the adult or family with agencies/services and interpreting for a language or sensory impairment
Absentee’ adult family members: If an adult carer is regularly absent from the home due to work commitments, leaving a child or young person in sole charge of care provision (e.g. after school, in the evenings, at weekends), then the young person will be eligible for Young Carers
How Ermine Primary Academy supports Young Carers
At EPA, we are aware that some students may well have caring roles at home.
We believe that all young people should have equal access to education, regardless of what is happening at home. When a young person looks after somebody in their family who has a disability, mental or physical ill-health or substance misuse problem(s), they may need a little extra support to help them get the most out of school.
We aim to understand the issues faced by young carers and to support any student who helps to look after somebody at home. For example:
- We have 2 member of staffs – Miss Thompson and Mrs Richards (SLT) who has the responsibility for young carers. We will let all new students know who we are and what we can do to help;
- We can provide students with confidential support and advice in school;
- We can issue young carers with a card which will flag up to staff that they have caring responsibilities at home so that students do not have to keep explaining their situation at home;
- We work closely with the Lincolnshire young carers’ service and can put students and their families in touch with them and other support services;
- If young carers are unable to attend out-of-school activities due to their caring role, then we will consider alternatives.
- We allow young carers to telephone home during breaks and lunchtimes;
- We include transitional opportunities for them to work with and meet other Young carers from our secondary partnership schools.
- We also have opportunities to meet other Young carers from other local primary schools as well.
We respect students’ right to privacy as a young carer and will only share information about them and their family with people who need to know so that they can help the young person.