Person Centered Planning

Helping children, young people and the people around them to make positive changes in their life of for their future can be really tricky. Often, young people’s opinions, wants and desires can be lost in professional jargon, adult perception and systems that aren’t always child friendly.

Person Centred Planning provides a way of helping a person plan all aspects of their life by exploring what is important to them as well as what is important for them. It ensures the individual has a choice and as much control as possible in making a plan which will affect their life.

In Person Centred Planning the individual is given choice in who comes to the planning meeting, where and when it is held and, crucially, that the person who the meeting is about, is always present. The most commonly used tools in ‘Person Centred Planning are called MAPS and PATHS, which are ‘big picture’ planning activities that need skilled facilitation to be successfully implemented.

The aim is not to fix anyone but to focus on imagining a desirable future – ‘a good life’ – and beginning to figure out what it will take to make this happen. The aim of Person Centred Planning is inclusion and ensures the commitment of each member of the team to help the individual to move forward in achieving their goals.

SISS staff have been trained in the facilitation of Person Centred Planning meetings, and can assist children and young people in the Stirling area by leading  meetings, giving a child-centred and creative approach to planning meetings.

Our person centred curriculum design offers meaningful opportunities for learning which are relevant and tailored to the assessed needs of each individual.  We place equal value on the development of skills needed beyond school and the attainment of recognised SQA qualifications and Wider Achievement awards.

We recognise that all learners require opportunities to build skills and relate them to real life situations and this takes time. We aim to take learning out of the classroom to help young people transfer skills now and after they leave school.

Therefore we provide a diverse range of learning experiences that are relevant to the needs of each individual, with opportunities to build the skills required for learning, life and work.

Activities to develop skills include opportunities such as:

• Local partners coming into school to lead activities
• Visits to local employers to find out what they do
• College visits and learning opportunities
• All learners working with Skills Development Scotland throughout their educational journey
• Work experience placements
• Vocational qualifications and work place recognised awards
• Support to access courses delivered at college

In all of our bases, we provide Flexible Learning Programs

A priority for Stirling Local Authority is ‘to look after all of our citizens, from early years through to adulthood, by providing quality education and social care services, to allow everybody to lead their lives to their full potential’. Where possible the council’s aim is to return our children and young people who are educated in residential settings, back to their local communities. Attending and taking part in learning- wherever that learning takes place- is fundamental to achieving this ambition.

SISS can provide individualised Flexible Learning Programs that are tailored to enable young people to make progress in literacy, numeracy and health and wellbeing through building on their skills, interests and strengths. The aim is to use relationship base, person centred approaches to increase engagement, allowing young people choice to focus on areas of interest as well as supporting areas of need. Often these learning activities are experiential rather than solely classroom based ensuring the skills developed can be transferred and combined with real life experiences.

We capitalise on a multi-agency approach to ensure care and support is planned and co-ordinated to reduce the need for accommodation, prevent exclusion and improve outcomes such as academic attainment, wider achievement awards and securing and sustaining a positive post school destination.

We are a forward looking service and are constantly developing our service to meet the needs of our young people, their families and communities.

Please click here to read SISS Service Improvement Plan 2018/19