In the build up to carers week young and young adult carers from Gloucestershire Young Carers have been continuing their campaigning for greater support in education for young carers, ensuring they receive equal opportunities to their peers.

Following meetings with their local MP’s, it was requested that a letter be written to The Secretary of State for Education, Bridget Phillipson, to request changes to the education system to help better identify and support young carers at all levels of education. The letter was co-written by young and young adult carers; Luna, Zaynab, Samuel, Meghan, Esme, and Lottie.  

‍

The letter outlined key recommendations such as:  

• Ensure the OFSTED framework specifies young carers  

• Implement a Young Carers Lead within every school in the UK

• Training on young carers should be a requirement  

• Schools should have a responsibility to ensure robust transitions for young carers  

• The re-enforcement of transition assessments for young carers  

‍

The letter has since been sent to the Secretary of State, by MP for Gloucester, Alex McIntyre, backing the letter and requesting a meeting with members of the ‘Our Voice’ and ‘YACtion’ forums. We have also received some additional support from Cameron Thomas, Rob Savage, Matt Bishop and Simon Opher. You can read the GYC Letter and YCNV Letter.

In addition to the co-production of the letter, representatives of ‘Our Voice’ and ‘YACtion’, Zaynab and Luna, travelled to London during the half term to join up with the Young Carers National Voice to meet with His Majesties Chief Inspector, Sir Martyn Oliver. At the meeting they discussed the different issues faced in their educational settings and walked through how they believed OFSTED could amend their framework to ensure support is in place for young carers. Sir Martyn spoke about potential changes he would like to introduce and got their thoughts on his suggestions including new phrasing around inclusion and training of staff, including OFSTED inspectors.  

Luna, one of the young carers who attended said: “The best part of these days is meeting other young carers across the country and speaking to people who can make a difference. I thought the meeting with Sir Martyn Oliver was very impactful and I was able to share lots of thoughts and have a quite determined discussion with him. I hope mine and the others make a difference in OFSTED supporting young carers across the country.”

Scott Bailey-Locke, Youth Participation Lead said: “To have representatives of young carers from all over the country come together to meet with His Majesties Chief Inspector is a very powerful step in improvising provision for young carers in education. The young carers were incredible in how they spoke with Sir Martyn, sharing their lived experience and using it to show why support in school is so important. As the head of OFSTED it was encouraging to hear his support for young carers and how he continues to highlight them in his work and his changing of the framework for schools."

Following on from the meeting with Sir Martyn Oliver, the young people travelled to Carers Trust offices to meet with the Department of Culture, Media and Sport to help discuss key findings in their most recent study into youth provision and help feed into their proposed youth strategy which will be launched later this year. The group discussed the lack of youth provision across the country, lack of youth voice in services and the co-ordinated approach by services to support young people.