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Volume 7 No.1 – February/March 2008 Contents Editorial The outcomes of secure care in Scotland
Protection through inspection: An exploration of the effectiveness of
Core skills appraisal project: Assessing and preparing adults to return Opening
the gifts and treasures of relationship in residential care Notes for
Contributors..........................................................................62 Welcome to the Scottish Journal
of Residential Child Care. It is hard to believe that the Scottish Journal of Residential Child Care has entered its sixth year of publication. In the first edition of the journal, we expressed our hopes that the journal would help us to look at developments in practice, policy, research and training at every level of residential child care. It was also one of our greatest hopes that the journal would help in `breaking down some of the barriers between practice and research' (Kendrick, 2002, p. 5). This prompted some reflection on the types of articles we have received and published over the years. Has the journal lived up to its promise? We have received articles from all over the world which has enabled us to bring fresh ideas and new perspectives from the international scene. We have succeeded in encouraging leading academics in our field to publish their most up-to-date research in this journal which helps our readers to keep up with developments. The journal has also been an important vehicle for disseminating the work of the Scottish Institute for Residential Child Care. Much of SIRCCs work has been published first in this journal. It has also acted as a springboard leading to wider publication. This lets the rest of the world know about the exciting work that is happening in Scotland and has led to many inquiries from other countries. We never really understood that the journal would have such an important role in international networking! The most important aspect, however, has been the contributions from practitioners working in residential child care. Many interesting approaches to practice have been described and evaluated by these practitioners. Their topics have ranged from using behavioural analysis with children affected by autism to examining assessment tools for young people leaving care. These pieces of work have gone a long way to demonstrate that practitioners can apply evidence-based approaches to evaluating their interventions. The papers produced have been a joy to read and feedback from authors indicates that many of them have found the process of publishing their work to be rewarding and valuable. We are also pleased to say that there has not yet been an edition of the journal where the direct voices of young people in residential care have not been heard. This is one of the achievements of which we are most proud. That's not to say that we are satisfied. We are looking at developing an electronic version of the journal to make it even more accessible. We would also like to encourage even more submissions from practitioners. In addition, we hope to have a `letters' page and would encourage anyone to write to us about topics which are pertinent to residential child care. Finally we would like to continue to include practitioner reviews of articles in future editions. If you would like to review an article for us and comment on its usefulness, or if you would like to share your thoughts about past articles, then please get in touch with us. Details on how to contribute and how to contact us are, as always, on the last page of the journal. We're looking forward to hearing from you.
Irene Stevens
Brendtro, L. & Ness, A.E. (1983). Re-educating troubled youth. New York: Aldine.
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