The Irish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (ISPCC)
The ISPCC is the national child protection charity in Ireland. Our vision is to see an Ireland where all children are safe, heard and valued and our mission is to make the protection of children everyone’s priority. We strive for this through the services we provide, which aim to build strong, resilient, children and families who can cope with challenges, solve problems and lead positive healthy lives. Through our services:
- We listen. Childline, as operated by the ISPCC, is Ireland’s only 24-hour listening service for children and young people. It is free, confidential and non-judgmental, providing support to children across Ireland via phone, text and web chat services. Childline will receive over 380,000 contacts from children and young people throughout Ireland in 2018
- We support. Our services provide children, young people and families with therapeutic support during traumatic times in their lives. For more information on our services, click here
- We protect. The ISPCC seeks to make child protection a national priority by advising the government on changes to policy and practices. We work with state agencies, employers, industries, schools and other organisations to build awareness of risks to children and to ensure high standards of practice.
The services the ISPCC provide include: Childline – phone, text and online services; Childhood Support Services; Mentoring Support Services for children and families, a Public Support Line and the National Missing Children’s Hotline. It costs approximately €6.5million to provide ISPCC services each year.
Childline
Childline provides a 24-hour listening service for all children in Ireland up to the age of 18. The service seeks to empower and support children using the medium of telecommunications and information technology.
Children and young people in Ireland can call Childline 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. Children and young people contact Childline for a wide range of reasons. They may wish to talk about issues such as bullying, sexuality, relationships with family members and friends or everyday life.
Childline receives over 380,000 calls and online messages every year. These are answered by volunteers who are trained to listen to and understand young people.
Childhood Support Workers
The ISPCC provides a free, comprehensive, community-based one-to-one support service (including out-of-hours access) to children and young people who may be experiencing emotional and behavioural difficulties. This is provided by professional ISPCC support workers.
Children and families come to us with a wide range of issues. Working with, and empowering children and families to overcome problems and lead happier, healthier, lives is just part of what we do. We actively target improving social inclusion through building connections and supporting relationships within families – giving them the skills to build a brighter future for their children.
Our approach is to build upon individual strengths and acknowledge the central role of children in decision making. The active participation of families is built into each intervention plan, ensuring that our work makes a lasting difference in the life of each child we work with. Our intervention plans are tailor-made to suit the needs of each individual child with support sessions available in the home or ISPCC centre during the day or out of hours.
Missing Children’s Hotline
The ISPCC runs Ireland’s National Missing Children’s Hotline, which takes calls from:
– The general public
– Family members of a missing child
– A child who is missing
We also provide emotional support to children who are missing and their families. In addition, we offer guidance and advice to callers regarding a missing child.
Anyone concerned about a missing child/ren can contact the National Missing Children’s Hotline by calling our free-phone number: 116 000.
Mentoring Programme
Our Mentoring services are evidence-based and empower young people to make positive social connections with others. Mentors actively support young people to communicate difficulties, helping them to relate more effectively to others. Having an improved social network and social support system acts as a buffer in times of stress, helping to ensure the child has added resilience in times of adversity.
Parent mentoring services increase the capacity of families to care for and meet the needs of their children. We intervene early in difficult situations with parents and work at their pace to ensure a manageable problem doesn’t become one which overwhelms the whole family.
Children or parents are matched with a volunteer mentor for periods of up to one year and they receive one-to-one time, guidance and support throughout this period and afterwards through our tracking service. The Mentor spends time with the young person each week to chat, have fun and to help the young person overcome any difficulties he/she may have.
The ISPCC is delighted to partner with Property Race Day 2019 for this year’s event. Thank you for your continued support.
