About the Organization

The Youth Endowment Fund (YEF) is a charity focused on preventing children and young people from becoming involved in violence. Their goal is to discover what works in violence prevention and turn that knowledge into effective practices.

About the Proposal

YEF’s focus is on Children’s Services, which includes various services delivered by local authorities to support children and protect vulnerable families. The specific services relevant to this proposal include:

Early Help: Support to improve outcomes and prevent escalating need (e.g., parenting support, play groups).
Children’s Social Care: Assistance to protect children and keep families together where possible.
Child Protection Services: Safeguarding children by making welfare enquiries and developing child protection plans.
Children’s Safeguarding Partnerships: Local multi-agency partnerships working to safeguard and promote the welfare of children.
Child in Need Services: Support for children identified as at risk (e.g., neglect, domestic abuse, disability).
Child Exploitation Services: Targeted support for children at risk of exploitation.
Edge of Care Services: Services for children and families at risk of entering the care system.

Note: Youth Justice, Health, and Education services are not included in this work as they are being addressed elsewhere by YEF.

YEF’s Children’s Services Work

YEF aims to publish recommendations by 2026 on how Children’s Services in England and Wales can help reduce serious youth violence. These recommendations will be based on:

Evaluations of Children’s Services projects (e.g., Fostering Connections, mentalisation therapy for parents).
YEF’s Toolkits (e.g., parenting programmes, multi-systemic therapy).
Insights from the Peer Action Collective regarding young people’s lives.
Further research into child criminal exploitation.

Consultancy Project Overview

By 2026, YEF will release two guidance reports:

Practice Guidance (for Directors of Children’s Services): Advice on leading services that protect children from involvement in violence.
Systems Guidance (for policy makers): Recommendations on policy changes to enable Children’s Services to protect children from violence.

To produce these reports, YEF has identified the need to prioritize certain areas of Children’s Services, including:

Extra-familial harm and child criminal exploitation: Due to the heightened risk of violence involvement.
Children in care and related services: Due to increased risk of violence among children in care.
Family therapy and parenting programmes: Proven potential to reduce violence involvement.

YEF is seeking an external consultant to help finalize the scope of these recommendations and answer the following questions:

What areas should YEF prioritize in their guidance to Directors of Children’s Services?
What new research is needed to better support children in care in reducing violence risk?
What new research is needed on parenting programmes and family therapy to reduce children’s involvement in violence?

Consultancy Details

Timeline: 15 days (from October to December 2024), split into stages (5 days for Question 1, followed by the remainder).
Day rate: £650/day.
Application Deadline: 9 AM, 30th September 2024.