Children and families services: For all other users

Types of children and families services Ofsted inspects

These are the types of children and families services that you can search by.

  • Adoption support agencies
    Adoption support agencies help adoption agencies in preparing and training adoptive parents. They also assist adoptees who have reached the age of 18 and would like to contact their original parents.
  • Boarding school
    This is a school where pupils study and live during term time. Independent boarding schools charge fees for tuition, board and lodging; maintained ones only for board and lodging.
  • Cafcass
    The Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (Cafcass) provides advice to the family courts and provides support and advice to children and families involved in family court proceedings.
  • Children's centres
    A Sure Start Children's Centre provides a range of services for children and their families from pregnancy right through to when a child goes into reception class at primary school.
  • Children's home
    Children's homes provide care and accommodation mainly for children and young people under the age of 18 where the local authority agrees this is in the child’s best interests.
  • Further education college with residential care
    This is a further education college that provides residential care for young people under 18 years of age.
  • Fostering services
    Fostering services find and recruit foster carers and then support them to look after children where the local authority agrees this is in the child’s best interests. Fostering services can be provided by an independent fostering agency or by the local authority.
  • Local authority
  • Local authority adoption agency
    Local authority adoption agencies plan whether adoption is in a child's best interests and will then make arrangements for a child to be adopted. Local authorities also find families for children who need to be adopted.
  • Local authority private fostering
    Privately fostered children are aged from birth to 15; they are placed with an adult for 28 days or more and are not looked after by the local authority. Parents and carers must notify the local authority of such arrangements and the local authority has a duty to check the child is safe and to support the private foster carer to meet the child’s needs..
  • Residential family centre
    Residential family centres provide short-term accommodation for children with their parents. During the placement the service monitors and assesses the parents' capacity to respond to their children's needs.
  • Residential special school
    This is a school for students with special educational needs which provides accommodation.
  • Secure training centres
    A secure training centre provides education, training and physical education for young people aged 10 to 17 who are on remand, or serving a Detention and Training Order (DTO), or are subject to a secure order under section 25 of the Children Act 1989.
  • Voluntary adoption agency
    A voluntary adoption agency is a not-for-profit organisation that finds families for children who need to be placed for adoption.

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