Parenting Assessment

[heartbrokenfather]

If possible I have a few more questions regarding this on going Parenting Assessment.

My 1st question is that is it normal for my wife and I to have separate Parenting Assessments, and not to have one together?

My 2nd question is it normal for one of the contact supervisors to be undertaking one of the Parenting Assessments. I would of thought this would be classed as a conflict of interest.

Thanks for your time.

Best Regards.

[heartbrokenfather]

This week should now be my last week of this Parenting Assessment.

I am still not quite sure how they are meant to assess my parenting skills, as each session is between 30-45 minutes maximum, and one of the people doing my parenting assessment sat in on one of the contact sessions and was present for no longer then 15 minutes, besides this one time the people carrying out the parenting assessment have not seen my interaction with any of the children.

I just can't see how anyone can make a fair and or complete assessment.

As I have never had a parenting assessment before I have no idea if this is normal or not.

Can anyone here please advice.

Thanks for your time.

Best Regards.

[ange301126]

Dear Heartbrokenfather, Yes it is normal for mum and dad to be seen seperately and it is quite usual for them to assess you whilst no children are present.They are not actually testing your practical skills,nappy changing etc.They are assessing your character,(how you were brought up etc.),your state of mind,attitude towards children(corporal punishment,discipline etc) and will make judgments as to if you are likely to be a good parent.Same with your wife.Please note we did an assessment just the same and it also was done by the woman who was manager of a contact centre. She was much more qualified than the rest of them and had two roles.One to manage the contact centre and the other being a parenting assessor.
Are you saying you have two assessors , one who is also a contact worker? We only had the one assessor.

[heartbrokenfather]

As far as I am aware both my wife and myself both have two assessors, so a total of four assessors in total.

One of my wife's assessors is also the current supervised contact worker.

I hope that makes more sense now, I am not always the best at trying to explain things.

Thanks again for your time.

Best Regards.

[ange301126]

Dear Heartbrokenfather,
The easiest way to explain how I think these assessments are conducted is to describe what happened to me.
I believe it will take some beating. I have actually had two parenting assessments .Both were undertaken for the same reasons,concerns and case background but by different local authorities.
One of the social work teams followed all due procedures and guidelines,carried out a core assessment correctly etc and actually interviewed us,kept us informed, compiled full and complete family background information and so on. Both of us passed with flying colours and the correctly conducted social work assessment ( orange-book) , the guardian's assessment and a psychological assessment were all very favourable too.Court proceedings went well for us.
This is why I always advise other parents to cooperate with the child-protection system fully and they should have nothing to fear.
AS LONG AS THEY FOLLOW FRAMEWORKS,GUIDELINES AND THE LAW.

The second social work team( from the neighbouring local authority) did nothing correctly,flouted all legal guidelines and set out to remove our children right from the start . We failed the parenting assessment, the Guardian's assessment and the social workers never even did a social work assessment even though ordered to by a court.
Our children were taken off us.This is why I advise parents to take legal action when their social workers don't conduct a case properly in any way.

If a social work team sets out its stall to support parents ( as the first team did) the assessments will be favourable. If the team sets out to take your children off you (an illegitimate aim) then assessments will be unfavourable.
In your case, what do you think the likelihood of a good assessment is?

[heartbrokenfather]

Once again thanks for your time and your advice.

With the way my local authority has acted and is still continuing act with the on going case, I am not expecting any positive outcome from there assessments, but I still could be totally wrong, and only time will tell.

My local authority has already made it very clear what they think and there intentions.

I am also currently researching where I stand with regards to taking legal action and what legal aid if any I can get.

Thanks again.

Best Regards.

[ange301126]

Dear Heartbrokenfather, Suzie has made the valid point before that just because sw's have run one family's case wrongly , it doesn't necessarily mean it will happen in every case.As you say,only time will tell.

During our proceedings ( the second set) my very experienced barrister actually told me in private that she doubted the parenting assessment would be a fair and impartial one and would be unfavourable! She had previous experience of the particular assessors concerned. However,she advised us to go ahead and cooperate anyway or the judge would take wrong inferences. Thus I was warned what was going to happen.What a fool I was! I still stuck to my belief that all would come right in the end.

[Suzie, FRG Adviser]

Dear heartbrokenfather,

You have asked a number of questions about the parenting assessment you have been involved with. Have you seen our information about assessments?

The usual procedure where a parenting assessment is undertaken is for both parents to be assessed for looking after their child(ren) jointly and separately. The parenting assessment can be carried out by one person. It will usually depend on what other expertise might be required to be part of the assessment, for example, a psychologist.

As Ange has quite rightly posted in a response to you different things are being considered during a parenting assessment not just practical tasks. The parenting assessment covers many areas and how you (or your wife) have been affected by your own upbringing and the effect on your parenting style.

I think the timing of the sessions will add up overall and should be sufficient for the person carrying out the assessment to reach a conclusion and make recommendations.

From you latest post the assessment has now ended. Have you received a copy of the assessment now?

Best wishes

Suzie

[heartbrokenfather]

As far as I am aware my Parenting Assessment has indeed finished.
And at my last assessment I asked when would I get a copy of the report, and was just told that they will have to type it up, it will then be passed to the social worker, it will then be passed onto there legal department and then my solicitor should receive a copy of the report.

So the short answer is I have no idea on the time frame for when I am expecting to receive a copy of this report.

Does anyone have any ideas on how long I should ideally be waiting for a copy of this report.

Thanks for your time.

Best Regards.

[ange301126]

Dear Heartbrokenfather, This is very important ; you should take heed ( and ask for Suzie's advice and that of your solicitor.
My parent assessment agreement included the stipulation that I should be shown the report and allowed to have comments on it BEFORE it was sent to the social worker!
The 'assessor' failed to keep to the agreement meaning I was unable to correct glaring mistakes and ' misunderstandings' which later proved to influence decisions against me.
The report stated wrongly that I was at the ' precontemplative stage ' and refused to acknowledge CS concerns and was 'unlikely' to change in timescales relevant to the children.Clearly,to me , the CS and The Guardian put that into their heads.Of course had I been allowed to raise questions on that specific point in accordance with the official assessment agreement,I would have cleared it up.I had contemplated issues fully and already made significant changes which had already been reported by the psychologist in his assessment.
Later the psychologist changed his assessment that I was well capable of cooperating with social workers in an addendum saying he was doing so after seeing the parenting assessment.
In fact they did not discuss the point with me at all and it was not one which was supposed to be.
THE OFFENDING PASSAGE AND DAMNING OPINION was added to the report later!
After seeing the psychologist's favourable report, the CS and Guardian contrived to send the assessors an additional letter of instruction without our knowledge.This was made clear by the parenting assessor. It was a successful ploy because they then asked the court to commission an addendum report from the psychologist who obliged by altering his opinion 'after seeing' it.
I hope this makes sense to you.
I spotted that your agreement also has a provision for you to review the report with the assessor before it is finalised and I recommend you insist on it to check for similar wrong 'opinions'.