IMPROVING EVIDENCE FOR BETTER OUTCOMES

We aim to improve the lives of children and families through setting standards and generating the best research into what works for children’s social care.

What Works for Children’s Social Care seeks better outcomes for children, young people and families by bringing the best available evidence to practitioners and other decision makers across the children’s social care sector.

We generate, collate and make accessible the best evidence for practitioners, policy makers and practice leaders to improve children’s social care and the outcomes it generates for children and families.

We work across three areas:

LATEST NEWS

  • read more about What Works for Children’s Social Care secures funding for two major research areas
    News

    What Works for Children’s Social Care secures funding for two major research areas

    3 August 2022
    What Works for Children’s Social Care (WWCSC) is launching two new research projects, supported by funding from the government’s Evaluation Accelerator Fund (EAF). The funding will be used to research strategies to support kinship carers and special guardians, and to evaluate the effectiveness of the ‘Staying Close’ residential care programme to support care leavers. Whilst […]
    A child slides down a yellow slide watched by a smiling mature couple
  • read more about Spark Grant Scheme 2
    News

    Spark Grant Scheme 2

    20 July 2022
    WWCSC is pleased to announce the launch of the second round of our Spark Grant Scheme. The purpose of this programme is to fund new and innovative research in children’s social care, conducted by researchers who might otherwise be underrepresented in the research community, and/or who might struggle to get funding through other routes. We […]
  • read more about Where are the secure children’s home places?
    Blog

    Where are the secure children’s home places?

    15 July 2022
    Written in collaboration with Dr Anders Bach-Mortensen, postdoctoral research fellow at the Department of Social Policy and Intervention, University of Oxford and previously affiliated researcher at WWCSC. Back in 2020, we looked at the pathways of children referred to secure children’s homes for welfare reasons, and discovered that two out of five children could not […]
  • read more about Practice in Need of Evidence call
    Blog

    Practice in Need of Evidence call

    13 July 2022
    Researching what works for children’s social care means we are often looking at sensitive issues, and some of these issues can be particularly upsetting. However, it’s vital that we look at even the darkest areas and challenges to make sure we are doing all we can to protect children and support families. I want to […]