National Children's Bureau

The National Children’s Bureau (NCB) is thrilled to publish our new five-year strategy, United for a Better Childhood: Building Brighter Futures, which sets out the key areas of focus to support its mission to build better childhoods for every child. For 60 years, NCB has united individuals and organisations across every area of children and young people’s lives, combining cutting-edge research with the voices of lived experience to improve the complex, interconnected systems that support every child to thrive. Our impact has been built on our ability to learn and evolve and this new strategy lays out how we will push further and do better, to respond to the unprecedented variety and scale of challenges children face today. All parts of NCB, including our newest member, Research in Practice, share core values and ambitions for children and young people and the new strategy sets out how this larger NCB family will achieve them working in partnership with experts from across the sector. Anna Feuchtwang, Chief Executive, National Children’s Bureau, said: “At a time when too many children and young people in England and Northern Ireland face myriad challenges to their physical and mental wellbeing, the National Children’s Bureau is setting out its vision for the next five years to build brighter futures for every child. Is our vision possible? Absolutely. Will it happen tomorrow? No. But that can never be an excuse not to push further and to do better for children. With NCB’s approach to tackling seemingly intractable problems and a stronger voice for children themselves, change is truly possible. We know that because we’ve been proving it for 60 years.” To find out more about our plans and strategic goals for the next five years, click here https://buff.ly/48lEMmy or download a copy here https://buff.ly/3I5VNGz

🎓 Applications are open for the next round of theatre workshops, led by disabled, care-experienced and migration-experienced children, and hosted in collaboration with Chickenshed Theatre and University of Kent. The first round of workshops took place this summer, and they were a huge success! 🎉 You can find out more about the project and how to get involved here: https://lnkd.in/eWrkzqFE

Keir Starmer, over 28,000 people are asking you to be a champion for children. Will you listen? Last week, we went to Downing Street to hand our petition in, along with five young ambassadors representing each of the charities. Now the government must listen and give children a seat at the table. #ChildrenAtTheTable

With children today facing challenges of an unprecedented variety and scale - including discrimination, stretched public services, an explosion in the numbers experiencing mental health issues, and increasing child poverty – our work is more important than ever. Our annual report for 2023-24, which we are publishing today, details the achievements and milestones we reached throughout the year, and how we are working to drive change so every child can thrive. In 2023-24 we celebrated our 60th birthday, developed a new five-year strategy, and welcomed a new member to the NCB family – @ResearchinPractice – among many other things. You can read about their achievements over the last year here: https://buff.ly/4f8XZMy We are incredibly proud of what we and our family members have achieved, and by reading about our work, we hope you are inspired to improve the lives of babies, children and young people. https://buff.ly/4f3FHfV

A couple of weeks ago, our CEO Anna Feuchtwang joined colleagues from Place2Be, the Centre for Mental Health and the Children and Young People's Mental Health Coalition (CYPMHC) at a round-table of education, health, community and research leaders focused on the issue of persistent school absence. Participants shared examples, stories and solutions from work on the ground with young people, backed by experience in schools and led by evidence. Following the roundtable a new report, School for All: Solutions for School Attendance, has been published, which is signed by twenty leading organisations from across the education, mental health, research, policy and the third sector, and sets out the steps needed to turn the tide on the school absence crisis. Together, we agreed that we need to reform school culture to make it an inclusive place where children want to be, to work collaboratively with families, to put support in place early, and tackle the drivers of persistent absence. You can read the report here: https://buff.ly/3LoIIJV and read more of Anna’s thoughts on the issue of school absence in an opinion piece published recently by Schools Week here: https://lnkd.in/eAsEyERT

Last week, we handed in a petition to Downing Street, with more than 28,000 signatures calling for the new PM and Chancellor to make children a priority. And look what was driving around Westminster! #ChildrenAtTheTable

Early years practitioners and managers can access evidence-informed resources to support the provision and delivery of early education and childcare at https://buff.ly/48VAnHf The resources have been selected and uploaded by the 18 Early Years Stronger Practice Hubs in England and can be searched by theme and type. The Stronger Practice Hubs website also provides details of events and professional development programmes local to each of the Hubs. NCB is the delivery partner for the Department for Education (DfE)'s Early Years Stronger Practice Hubs programme, which was created to provide advice, share good practice and offer evidence-informed professional development for early years practitioners.

We want to build better childhoods for every child, but there is so much to do, sometimes it's difficult to know where to start. This is why we came up with a virtuous circle that helps us improve our work and have the most impact.    This is how we work to bring about change:  🟡 We identify areas of need  🔵 We influence policy  🔴 We implement learnings from research  🟣 We improve systems supporting children and young people...  🔄 ...and then we find out where we should focus next, rotating once again around the circle.    We're very proud of it! What would you add?    strategy.ncb.org.uk  #BuildingBrighterFutures

As the new Government enters Parliament it is the perfect time for children and young people to add their message to our #ChildrenAtTheTable tablecloth which will be presented to new MPs. Find out about how the babies, children and young people you work with can add their voices to the campaign here: https://lnkd.in/eB--nkAw Action for Children, Barnardo's, The Children's Society, NSPCC

On behalf of babies, children and young people across the UK, CEOs from the Children's Charities Coalition extend a warm welcome to our new Prime Minister. Prime Minister, we urge you to put #ChildrenAtTheTable. https://buff.ly/4buP3hO