SEMH and Behavioural Support
Support for young people whose behaviour is telling everybody something that nobody has worked out yet.
Nobody behaves like that for no reason
SEMH stands for social, emotional and mental health needs. In practice the young people referred to us under it are usually the ones who have been excluded, moved, or described in a referral form using words that make the next provider say no.
Our starting position is that behaviour is communication. A young person who runs, refuses, shouts or destroys things is telling everybody something, usually something about safety, control or loss, and usually something they cannot say any other way. The work is understanding what, not suppressing the behaviour and calling that progress.
A lot of these young people are looked after children. Many have moved repeatedly. Some are unaccompanied children who have arrived in this country alone, which brings its own combination of loss, disrupted education, language, immigration uncertainty and separation from everybody they know. Some are in transition between children services and adult services and are frightened about what happens at eighteen.
What they nearly all have in common is a long experience of adults leaving. Every placement that broke down taught them that this one will too. The single most useful thing any service can do is not leave, and that means not ending support at the first serious incident.
We work alongside schools, social workers, youth offending teams, CAMHS and immigration solicitors where relevant. We are not a clinical service and we do not provide therapy, but we are frequently the reason a young person actually gets to the appointment.
We are a care and support provider, not a mental health treatment service. Assessment, diagnosis and therapy come from CAMHS and other clinical services, and we work alongside them.
This is likely right if
- A young person is presenting behaviour that has ended previous placements
- A looked after child needs support that will not withdraw at the first incident
- An unaccompanied young person needs practical and emotional support
- School has broken down or is close to it
- A young person is approaching eighteen and the transition is going badly
Something else may fit better if
- Secure accommodation is what is required
- What is needed is clinical mental health treatment, which is CAMHS
- A young person needs urgent psychiatric assessment, which is an emergency route
How we work with these young people
Slowly, consistently, and with far more patience than most placements are given the chance to show.
Working out the function
What the behaviour is achieving or avoiding. Almost always safety, control, attention or escape. Understanding it is what changes it.
Being predictable
The same adults, the same responses, the same boundaries whoever is on shift. Inconsistency is read as unfairness and unfairness escalates everything.
Not leaving
An incident does not end the placement. Every young person here has a history of adults giving up, and repeating it teaches them they were right.
Repairing afterwards
What happens after an incident matters more than what happens during it. Coming back, talking it through, carrying on.
Education and immigration
Getting a young person back into school, college or training. For unaccompanied children, getting them to solicitor appointments and Home Office interviews.
Real relationships
Being someone a young person will actually tell things to. That takes months and it is what everything else depends on.
What is included, and what is not
Set out plainly so there is nothing to discover later. Anything not listed here can still be discussed, and often arranged.
Included as standard
- A support plan built on understanding the behaviour rather than only managing it
- Consistent staff and consistent responses across shifts
- Support that continues through incidents rather than ending at them
- Practical support with education, training, appointments and daily living
- Support for unaccompanied children including appointments and immigration processes
- Joint working with social workers, schools, CAMHS and youth offending teams
- Support into and through the transition to adult services
Arranged separately
- Secure accommodation
- Therapy and clinical mental health treatment
- Legal representation, though we will get a young person to their solicitor
- Education, which is a school or college responsibility
From first call to first visit
Most referrals come from local authorities and social workers, often after another placement has broken down.
Referral
Tell us the full history including everything that has gone wrong. We would much rather know in advance than discover it in week three.
Assessment and matching
Needs, risks, and who the young person would be living alongside. Getting that wrong is how placements break.
A planned start
Introductions and a staged arrival where the situation allows. Emergency placements are taken the same day where they cannot.
Support and review
A named worker, regular review, and joint working with everybody else involved.
How this is paid for
Almost always funded by the placing local authority. Where a young person is a looked after child, the corporate parenting responsibilities of the local authority sit behind the placement.
For unaccompanied children the placing authority is normally the one where the young person presented, or the authority they have been transferred to under the national transfer scheme. Emergency placements are taken first and funding confirmed afterwards.
Read the full guide to fundingWhat families ask us about this
Will you take a young person whose placement has just broken down?
Yes, and that is a lot of what we do. Our emergency service runs twenty four hours a day for children as well as adults. Tell us the history honestly and we will give you a straight answer quickly.
Do you support unaccompanied asylum seeking children?
Yes. That includes the practical side of appointments, solicitors, Home Office processes and getting into education, and the fact that these young people have arrived alone and have lost everybody.
What happens after a serious incident?
We repair and carry on. Ending a placement at the first incident confirms exactly what the young person already believes about adults, and it makes the next placement harder for whoever takes them.
Do you provide therapy?
No. Therapy and clinical mental health treatment come from CAMHS and other clinical services. What we frequently provide is the reason a young person actually attends.
What about turning eighteen?
Transition is one of the worst points in the whole system and we support it specifically, up to twenty five. It has its own page.
Will you take a referral other providers have declined?
We will look at it properly. A referral form full of difficult history is not an automatic no here. The more complex the need, the more it matters that somebody says yes.
Services that often go together
Transitions Support, Ages 14 to 25
Support across the move from children services into adult life, planned from fourteen rather than panicked about at seventeen.
Read moreEmergency Placements
Somewhere safe tonight. We answer emergency referrals twenty four hours a day, every day of the year.
Read moreLearning Disabilities and Autism Support
One to one and group support for children with learning disabilities and autistic children, built around communication, sensory needs and routine.
Read moreIf the referral form reads badly, send it anyway
We take referrals other providers decline, and we answer emergency referrals for children twenty four hours a day.
Emergency placements are answered 24 hours a day, seven days a week.