PLACEMENT BRIEFING CHILDREN & YOUTH SERVICES

1. PLACEMENT BRIEFING CHILDREN & YOUTH SERVICES Heidi HUI 2013 Chan ki 2014

2. Children & Youth Services (excluding SSW) • 138 Integrated Children & Youth Services Centers ICYSC • 23 C&Y centers • 19 district youth outreaching social work teams (YOTs) including 3 new teams in Tseung Kwan O, Ma On Shan and Tung Chung respectively on 1 January 2013 • 5 teams community support service scheme • Residential services/ Homes (aged 7-21), hostels (aged14-21), Small group homes • Internet services (Pilot project to identify youth-at-risk through internet) • Service for Drug Abuser • Hotline Services (HKFYG) • Other Special Services

3. Centre Services/中心服務 • Integrated Children and Youth Service Centres (ICYSCs)/綜合青少年服務中心 • Children and Youth Centres (CYCs)/兒童及青年中心

4. Integrated (Children &Youth) Team Service • Report on Review of Children & Youth Centre Services(1994) • Integrated Children and Youth Services Centres (ICYSCs) • C&Y centre services+ outreaching social work + School social work service • Target: aged 6-24 children and youth/ parents (age range: flexible)

5. Opening hours • ICYSCs have different operating hours • 3 types of sessions: • morning session (10 a.m. to 1 p.m.) • afternoon session (2 p.m. to 6 p.m.) • and evening session (7 p.m. to 10 p.m.). 

6. Services Rendered • Core programmes – guidance nature (guidance and counseling, supportive services for young people in disadvantaged circumstances, socialization programmes and development of social responsibility and competence) • Non-core programmes (drop-in service, interest groups, summer youth program and study/reading room service)

7. Learning opportunities • Group work (such as: volunteer training, social skills training), workshops and mass program (camps and adventured-based activities) in the ICYSCs; • Working with different colleagues and even outside organization (such as: Schools, IFSCs/ SWD Field Unit/ District Council etc)

8. Things to Note • Casework?! (chance is very low) • Working hours (evenings, weekend and holidays) • Drop-in service?! • Study room/ tutorial classes • Initiative / Teamwork • Children VS adolescence • Special groups: SEN children, children & youth of new arrivals & low income families

9. Services for Youth-at-risk /邊緣青少年服務 • District Youth Outreaching Social Work Service/ 地區青少年外展社會工作服務 • Overnight Outreaching Service for Young Night Drifters (YNDs) 青少年深宵外展服務 • Community Support Service Scheme (CSSS) 社區支援服務計劃 • Young people who are placed on probation order or under the Police Superintendents’ Discretion Scheme (PSDS), or those who completed 1-year aftercare service after their discharge from detention or rehabilitation centers in the youth support service

10. CSSS • Community Support Service Scheme (CSSS) aims at helping children and youth cautioned under the Police Superintendent's Discretion Scheme with a view to re-integrating them into the mainstream education or work force and reducing the likelihood of re-offending.

11. CSSS • the five CSSS teams were attached to five existing Integrated Children and Youth Services Centres. • The service content includes individual and family counselling, therapeutic groups, skill training/educational groups, adventure activities as well as recreational and community services

12. Service Rendered (outreaching) • Target: 6-24 youth-at-risk • Reach out to individuals and groups who use to hang around in public premises; • Possible working spots: football pitches, parks, game centers, fast food shops, street corners, shopping malls… • Casework, groupwork, mass program

13. Things to Note • Acceptance and confidence in handling their testing behaviors and misbehaviors; • Irregular working hours and outdoor work; • Independent, initiative, creativity, interest in working with these youngsters; • Frustration ?!

14. Services for Drug Abusers • Voluntary Residential Treatment and Rehabilitation Services/ 自願住院治療及康復服務 (e.g. Hong Kong Christian Service Jockey Club Lodge of Rising Sun) • Counselling Centres for Psychotropic Substances Abusers/濫用精神藥物者輔導中心 (e.g. TWHGs CROSS Centre, PS33)

15. Counselling Centres for Psychotropic Substances Abusers • It aims at providing counselling and assistance to habitual/occasional/potential psychotropic substance abusers and to young people at risk with a view to assisting them to abstain from psychotropic substance abuse and develop healthy life style.

16. Services provided • case and group counselling for psychotropic substance abusers; • counselling for their family members; • regular preventive education programmes/talks for secondary students and the community

17. Correctional and Offender Services • Secondary setting, government institutes usually located at remote areas. • Need to follow strict security e.g. security check at every main-gate area • Dealing with clients who have committed crimes, clients’ family support work may not be possible.

18. Correctional and Offender Services • Working hours from 8am to 5pm at restricted working conditions, with rare outside duties. E.g. when working inside the office, all personal mobiles or private computers need to be kept at the visitors’ lockers.  Internet service is limited within the work setting. • Require to be familiar with the rules and regulations of each institute.

19. Correctional and Offender Services • When performing case interviewing or group sessions or projects, additional staff would be placed in the room for security support reason. • Placement supervisor may have limited on-site supervisions to placement students owing to the security reason, therefore, additional supervision meetings need to be arranged at HKU on non-placement days.

20. Others • Mother’s Choice Pregnant Girls’ Service

21. Residential Services 住 宿 照 顧 服 務 • Non-institutional Care 非 院 舍 服 務 • Ordinary Small Group Home: 4 to 18 years old 兒 童 之 家 -- 照 顧 4 至 18 歲 以 下 的 兒童 for those needy families who could not take care of their children temporary. We would provide a home-like environment for the children until they can return to their families or a long-term alternative living arrangement is achieved • Integrated Small Group Home - 7 children with ages of 4 to 18 and 1 mildly mentally handicapped child with ages of 6 to 18

22. Institutional Care 院 舍 服 務 • Boys' / girls' homes(男 / 女 童 院) - for children or young persons aged 7 and under 21 with behavioral or emotional problems. Schools for Social Development are run within some of these homes (e.g. Society of Boys' Centres : Shing Tak Centre扶幼會誠德中心) • Boys’/ girls hostels - for young persons between 14 and under 21 years of age who are studying or working (e.g. Youth Outreach Crisis Centre for Boys協青社危机介入中心 (aged 8-18))

23. Learning Opportunities • Engagement skills; • Trust and attachment • Daily operation in structured setting • Case, group, programs • Inter-disciplinary cooperation (such as: nurses, child care workers, teachers);

24. Some Remarks • Odd Working hours (Shift, work in evening, weekends, Sundays & public holidays occasionally) • Developmental/ Educational-Prevention-Remedial • Children in ICYSCs and CYCs as more common • Groups and Programs, Cases possible (except in C&Y center services) • Unmotivated and involuntary clients (CSSS, drug abusers…) • Residential setting: dual roles as on discipline and counseling

25. Requirements on worker: T.O.R.C.H. T: Testing behavior, O: Outgoing, R: Responsive, C: Creative, H: Humor

26. Useful websites • http://www.swd.gov.hk/en/index/site_pubsvc/page_young/ • http://www.hkfyg.org.hk/ • http://www.bgca.org.hk/ • http://hkcs.org/gcb/ps33/ps33.html • http://www.cycschool.edu.hk/content/ • http://yo.org.hk/center/service.htm

27. Youth Services Coordinators • Ms. Chan Ki (kichan@socwork.hku.hk) • Ms. Heidi Hui (skhui@hku.hk)