Listen to thisIntroduction
I walk into a residential child care centre on my first day of work
on a rainy day in Autumn 2003. I have a new post at my College as
Director of a Centre for Child and Youth Care Learning and I have
scheduled myself to work one shift a week in direct Child and Youth Care
practice to let me experience the rhythms of care and to assist me in
grounding my academic theorising. It is going to be a challenging
experience for me and I am nervous. The Manager, “Cormac”, is a
wonderfully charismatic individual, full of fun and tremendously
engaging. Unsurprisingly, he is male as are so many residential child
care managers here in Ireland. The building is warm and bright and there
are the usual clothes and objects strewn around the living room. Two of
the female staff are sitting sharing coffee and a conversation.
I walk through to the kitchen and notice the chef, and a female and male social care worker. The male is busy, with his arms deep in suds washing dishes. We know each other from College and he turns and smiles. “Jesus, Niall, this is gender discrimination, eh?". We all laugh. It is a wonderful ice-breaker. “Conor” is studying for a Degree in Child and Youth Care and is washing the dishes. This is good. It is good because I have met too many students who feel such tasks are below them and “are not why they have spent three or four years in College". But I feel, like “Conor”, that it is in such moments that we can interact meaningfully with youth in a place of safety. Now, I am the first to admit that I am not the best housekeeper. But, I’m certainly prepared to give it a go. I joke with the staff.
Daily life in a home for children and youth care is a fascinating place to be.
On playing chess in residential Child and Youth Care
The Manager, “Cormac”, invites me outside to be witness to a process
of negotiation between one of the service users and he. I sit quietly in
the background and only volunteer thoughts when I am asked directly. It
is difficult to understand who is the more skilled negotiator in this
encounter. Both are so adept at anticipating each other’s next move.
Both have years of experience in the Child and Youth Care system. I
begin to understand why I have always been so poor at chess. I want to
move my key players in for the kill too quickly. But not “Cormac” or “Elsie”. They are keeping their powder dry. They move cautiously around
the board, volunteering the odd pawn but guarding the King and Queens.
In the background, “Kevin” hovers (the boyfriend).
"Can I spend my own money if I earn it Cormac?"
"What might you want to spend it on Elsie?"
"That’s up to me isn’t it because I earned it".
"We’ll have to see what your care staff think", says Cormac. No one loses on this exchange as both test each other out. I smile and think of the way such a conversation was so typical of my own house growing up and I am sure it is the experience of many Child and Youth Care workers.
The moment is broken when two of the care staff arrive to see if we need anything in the store. The game is not finished. Both players merely stop their clocks and wait to resume the game another time.
The last time I worked (or should I say survived) in direct practice was in the mid 1990’s in Limerick City when I worked with a group of amazing children and staff from a special educational initiative called St. Augustine’s School. Here, I learned a great deal about the usefulness of recreational activities for young boys and girls. I later worked with an initiative called DORAS (Befriending People in Prostitution) in Waterford City, but this was as Chair of a voluntary organisation and I only occasionally engaged in street work.
It’s my second shift and there are more staff around today. I meet one of my ex-students, “Amber”, from another lifetime and college programme. Surprisingly, she is still talking to me! Again, the environment is a positive one. The staff work well together and there is an air of ease and familiarity in the agency. We end up playing a game involving cards where each staff is invited to choose one card for the day and then “Amber” reads out the meaning for us. It’s great fun. A visiting social worker partakes in the game. Ironically, at one point, there are four males sitting around a table discussing Child and Youth Care. A rare occurrence and “Conor” makes a joke about the unusually high levels of testosterone in the unit! Later in the day, “Cormac” and I sit down for a while in this office and he explains for me the many forms and procedures for accepting youth to the unit. So many forms!
It is a truism in Child and Youth Care that food is the great socialiser and the food in this unit is worthy of any hotel both in substance and presentation. I notice that when one of the youth arrives in after his day project, his first request is for some dinner. In this request there is great safety, consistency, mutuality. It also presents us with an opportunity, a window if you like, to engage with him. In my case, strangely, it was about tennis.
For the past couple of years, I have wanted to experience Child and Youth Care first hand again and remove myself from the ivory towers of academia (or in my case, the concrete towers). For it is in such moments, 'on the floor' as they say, that the skilled practitioner engages with a child or youth. I know that this cannot be learned in a sterile class environment, but I do think such environments are both necessary and useful “as with any training. I also wonder, with all my theorising over the years, will I be skilled in the field? Only time (and my fellow staff and supervisor) can tell. And, of course, the youth I work with. They are the experts.
