QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS

Interpersonal

How will you treat me, my guests and my family?

How you are treated as a resident of Summit Lodge and how your guests and family are treated is important to us. We provide personalised support when and where you need it. Our staff will always treat you and your family with dignity and respect.

At Summit lodge you don’t just receive a bed to sleep in, you get a home, you have a place where you can base yourself and move on with your life. As you know life can be difficult and challenging. We are a therapeutic service, and so at Summit Lodge you will find that you are not alone in working through your emotional difficulties, we will help you to develop that emotional resilience and positive coping skills through the option of in-house therapy when you need it. What you want to do? What do you want to achieve? Your potential is what we at Summit Lodge want you to reach. We are about working with you and keeping you safe. It is also important to us that your guests are welcome and treated with respect. Your family will find that we are supportive and we will work with you and them where you consent for us to do so in a way that is healthy, safe and beneficial for you.

Social interactions and family connections are important to make and retain and so we will help you to keep those positive relationships in your life. This is how we will treat you, your guests and family.

What makes you so good at what you do?

There are many things that make us good at what we do. The first is that we do not forget you in the process. As our resident and client we do not forget that you are an individual and that you are different from another client. How are your needs different? We take that into consideration. What have been your experiences? We take that into consideration. Where do you want to get in life? We take that into consideration. At summit Lodge our key workers help young people to identify their goals such as going to college, getting a job or living in their own home and draw up a support plans to break down these goals step by step.

This builds on strengths and addresses challenges such as:

  • Enjoying a healthy diet and lifestyle
  • Staying safe
  • Managing money and accessing benefits
  • Personal development, goals and aspirations.

We support young people to gain the living skills they need to make the successful transition to adulthood.
We help clients gain the life skills they need to build the foundations for independent living.
We work with you to improve your life opportunities.
We make plans and we follow through with them, this is what makes us so good at what we do.

Trust & Honesty

How do we know we can trust you?

You being able to trust us is very important to us. We have policies and we stick to them on confidentiality and sharing information. We work with you, your family and loved ones to support you through difficult times and to ensure that those at risk are safe guarded from harm.

We aim to find a balance between your need for independence, privacy and our duty to keep you safe.

You have a right to expect that the information you give us will be treated as confidential. We believe in earning and keeping your trust. We are committed to providing a service that meets your needs and we are interested in listening to you and your views and to discuss your issues and concerns. We spend time to get to know your personality and we take into consideration what you like and dont like doing. We also set good ground rules so you are clear where you stand and what our expectations are of you. We give you the opportunities to get to know us and to show that you too can be trusted. Staff work with you, it is not just about telling you what to do but enabling you to do things for yourself.

At Summit Lodge you will have both formal and informal meetings that will be in a more relaxed area. We also do cooking activities, go on trips and have movie nights to help you be more comfortable in interacting with staff.

We will follow up on the things we promise to do; we will be reliable and we will treat your views seriously. This is why you can trust us.

Key Worker Skills

How do you use modern technology in daily work with young people?

Using modern technology is important in our daily work with young people. Young people are very good at using technology and so it is important to enhance their skills and to tap into this when communicating with them. When young people are away from placement we use mobile phones, texts and WhatsApp to communicate with them. When they are at placement all our sites have WiFi access that clients can use. This internet access is protected by firewall and security to keep them safe when browsing the net.

We also use YouTube videos where it is interactive or engaging in teaching different life skills such as budgeting.

During key working we use computers to do internet searches on what opportunities are available to our young people. We also help them to do job searches, college or training applications and submitting these applications online. These are some examples of how we use modern technology in our daily work with young people.

I hope you find this helpful in answering your questions.