“Earlier this year we had our first Ofsted inspection since we opened – I was very nervous – and we were delighted to receive a ‘good’ rating in all areas. As a five-bedroom home for children and young people with additional needs, it was important to us that Ivytree House be above all else, a truly homely home.

“And so it was fantastic to have that attention to detail recognised in the report. We handpicked everything in the house so it does not feel generic or institutional – we are a home – and we get lots of compliments, including from Ofsted, on how the home looks and feels.

“We have a lovely, calm environment. It’s never really very noisy, I’d call it very ‘zen’ actually!

“As a home, we’re really well set up to support children who may have very different needs and wants and support them to live together harmoniously and strike a good balance.

“We work hard to help our young people maintain or re-establish contact with their families – where it is right and appropriate to do so of course – and have had real success with that, whether that is supervised or unsupervised, we will support the young person and the family to make those family times successful and positive.

“Education or helping young people achieve their potential and explore their interests is also vitally important to us here. Where a child might struggle in an academic environment due to their challenges such as ADHD or autism, then we will help source alternative provisions or strategies to make sure they can still access education. 

“What we want to do is be the child’s safe place, a place they know they can always rely on us to stick with them, to be there for them. We have excellent staff retention and that’s so important, as is the mix that we have. Our staff team are all ages, genders and experiences – that means the children get the best of many, many worlds and exposed to lots of different positive influences.

“We are also able to support children for whom foster placements have broken down, those who might put themselves at risk and young people with really quite complex needs. We work with local mental health teams and others to make sure we have the infrastructure in place to best support the children’s specific needs.

“We’ve tried hard to make Ivytree a home where someone would really want to be both to work and live. There are difficult days but we have good routines, we have good structure. Our aim is to be a place where they can do things at their own pace, in a safe environment where they feel they can be who they are and who they want to be in their futures.”