What is the role of the Birmingham Parent Carer Forum?
We are a group of voluntary parent carers who have children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND). Whilst the forum is not a support group, we actively seek to work in collaboration with all parent carers, parent support groups, community groups, schools, voluntary and grassroots organisations to gather voices and experiences to influence change and challenge service design.
We work with organisations that provide services for families. We are an independent strategic partner to the local authority, Integrated Care Board (ICB) and The Children’s Trust. We gather the views of local families and share diverse experiences and challenges with service providers. We want to ensure the concerns and voices of parent carers are heard, listened to, valued and used to make change. We will hold the statutory services to account and challenge decisions when families are telling us it’s not working. Our goal is to improve outcomes for all children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities
Watch the new BPCF video
Who Can Join?
The Birmingham Parent Carer Forum welcomes anyone who provides care to children or young people (0-25) with special educational needs and disabilities living in or accessing SEND services in Birmingham. We are committed to being inclusive of all families from diverse backgrounds and disabilities. These may range from but are not exclusive to complex medical needs, neurodevelopmental, learning and/or physical difficulties.
BPCF Representative Roles
A key part of our updated model of working is the new roles we have made available to Parent Carers and Professionals. These roles will enable the forum not only to increase its capacity which will help create a stronger collective voice and most importantly achieve its aim of creating better services for children and young people. Below is a break down of the three new roles.
parent Rep |
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A Parent Rep will be a parent carer who will attend meetings on behalf of the forum acting as the parent voice or an expert by experience. They complete feedback forms to keep the committee up to date with the work they are involved in whilst also sharing their experience with other Reps and linking in with Community Reps. |
Community Rep |
A Community Rep will be a member of a charity, support group or third-sector organisation who works with or supports children/young people and families with SEND in Birmingham. They will also be a member of the Birmingham SEND Community Round Table and will share information from the families within their local community in order to extend the reach of the parent voice. |
Committee Rep |
A Committee Rep will act as a lead rep within a group for example the Parent reps or the Community reps. They will attend Committee meetings to act as the link between their group and the Committee members. Committee Reps will not have the same responsibilities as Committee members and will not be expected to attend all meetings Committee members are expected to attend. |
Join the Birmingham Parent Carer Forum
If you are compassionate and have a strong desire for change and have experience you can offer to strengthen the forum? Then you can join the BPCF as a voluntary Parent Representative. The main aim of a Parent Representative is to spread the BPCF’s vision for Birmingham and raise awareness of the forum. This can be done in a number of ways. Either by participating in projects within Education, Health or Social Care having a strategic input into services, or supporting other families at coffee mornings and support groups. The Parent Representative role can be shaped to meet your experiences and interests.
All Parent Representatives will be supported by a member of the Committee and will receive training to ensure they have all the skills and knowledge needed to fulfil their role. If you would like to become a Parent Complete the online form on the BPCF website.