If you have a concern you can speak to any of these teachers or find out more on our safeguarding page.

• Early help is a consent-driven family support service which supports with a wide range of issues that might be impacting on daily family life.
• If there are a range of issues such as education, mental health or behaviour, then a family worker could support the family through these issues and be able to offer advice and suggestions on how to make improvements.
• It is a voluntary service, so parents can change their minds about engaging if they feel it's not the right service for them.
• Early help is a service that supports to try and prevent things from escalating any further.
• The family works with the school to complete the referral so they are involved from the beginning with what support is being requested.
• It is different from social care; they are not social workers. They work with families before they meet social care level of need.
• Sometimes you just need another person, outside the family setting, to see things from a new perspective and offer advice.
• Early Help would still work alongside school, so school would still be involved in the offer of support.

Targeted Early Help supports children and families who have multiple and complex unmet needs requiring a targeted response but below Children’s Social Care threshold and where Universal Plus “Earliest Possible Help” has not enabled effective change to be made. These unmet needs may be complex and could impact on the child and family's daily life.

Targeted Early Help in Oldham is delivered by two services: 

• Council Family Connect supports families with more complex needs, typically for up to around 6 months.
• Positive Steps are commissioned to provide support where needs are less complex, and families need to be supported less intensively, typically for up to around 4 months.