Janice has extensive experience across youth, community and residential provision. She has led several residential homes in England to ‘outstanding’ Ofsted judgements (regulatory and inspection framework) and contributed to the development of award-winning services within the residential and edge of care sector. She is a committed advocate of joined up services for vulnerable adolescents.
As the co-author of North Yorkshire County Council’s NWD model, Janice has been instrumental in the design and effective delivery of this innovative approach. The learning from it has supported many local authorities and organizations to ‘re-think care’ for adolescents.
NWD was chosen as one of three evidence informed models to be rolled out nationally in England between 2019-2024, as part of the Department for Education Strengthening Families, Protecting Children Program. Janice was the author of North Yorkshire’s offer and the strategic lead for the roll out of the program.
Janice is passionate about providing young people with improved opportunities to develop their life chances and believes that relationships are at the heart of practice both with young people, staff teams and key partners. She believes that a ‘learning community’ is vital and that skills, experience and resources can be shared and pooled, which not only benefits young people but delivers more cost-effective services.
Janice is the author of one of the ‘from the field’ chapters in the newly published international volume: ‘Revitalizing Residential Care for Children and Youth – cross national trends and challenges’ (OU Press, Whittaker, Holmes, Del Valle and James 2022).