Young Parents Work
03 Nov 2009
Research Focus - Young Parents in Wirral
A member of staff from TCP is currently conducting Masters Research in Counselling & Psychotherapy at Liverpool John Moores University. The aim of this research is to explore the experiences of young parents within their family and partner relationships. In association with WMC, Tranmere Community Project work with approximately 50 young parents per year who live in the Wirral and we are one of the only services whose courses for young parents are shaped and developed by Psychotherapists, providing an environment for young parents to explore and work on their own personal identities and behaviour.
It is hoped that the results of the research will help us to improve and enhance the full-time programmes that we currently offer to young parents on the Wirral. We feel there is a clear need to move away from statistical portrayals of young parents' lives and look toward better developing the support processes that enable young parents to make the transition from adolescence to parenthood. It is these processes that will help to develop the health, wellbeing and potential of young parents and their children throughout Wirral.
Peer Education Programme - Young Parents tackling teenage pregnancy
A group of young parents who took part in the research came up with a plan that they felt may have helped them in making a more informed choice about becoming a young parent. Wirral currently has one of the highest teenage pregnancy rates in Europe and government policies are keen to tackle this. Through taking part in the research above, young mothers suggested that they may have benefited from extra work which complimented sexual health and relationships work currently going on in schools. They felt that the research gave them the chance to explore reasons why they may have wanted a baby at a young age. For some of the young women we work with, they felt they had made an informed choice that it was the right time for them to have a baby, but for others, they felt that they may have been choosing to have a baby to fulfil other needs that could have been met in alternative ways. They felt the therapeutic nature of the work we do with young parents had given them the chance to explore in depth their own personal development and self-identities and had they explored this earlier, some felt they may have made different choices.
We have worked with our young parents to further develop this idea and in association with the Wirral Learning Consortia we are now training a group of young parents to become peer educators. Alongside their own continued personal development programme, these young mothers are working with a Psychotherapist at TCP to put together a programme for working with other young people of secondary school age (12-16). This course will be offered to secondary schools on the Wirral and will be run by young parents alongside a Psychotherapist and a Youth Worker from TCP. The aims of this programme will be two-fold:
1. Enable secondary school pupils to explore and process the realities of being a young parent. Young people will be able to look at the financial and emotional impacts of becoming a young parent and the impact becoming a parent has on relationships, friendships, future education and career path. This course will aim to compliment existing SRE education offered by schools and give students a chance to consider the realities of what comes 'after the bump'.
2. To provide continuing support and development to young parents - by taking part in this programme, young parents are able to continue with their own personal development and build the skills, confidence and self-esteem to encourage them to realise their own potential for further training and employment. Young parents are able to have a direct involvement in shaping and progressing support provisions available to young people on the Wirral.
We are currently piloting some of this work with pupils on our Alternative Education Programme with very positive results.
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