The Centre for Child Mental Health

Aim of the Centre

OUR MISSION STATEMENT
Empowering professionals and parents to enable children and young people to thrive

Functions of The Centre for Child Mental Health

To support anyone working to improve the emotional health of children and young people with practical tools and techniques
To provide child professionals with greater insight, awareness and depth, where constraints often mean that key theory and practice has not been sufficiently addressed in previous training
To empower professionals to work more effectively and confidently with children, young people, parents and families
To address the urgent need for many more people to be trained to work effectively and ethically with the unmet emotional and relational needs of children, young people, parents and families. (In the UK, there are over 30,000 children and young people on waiting lists for mental health services)
To broaden the impact of the most up-to-date research about the emotional well-being and mental health of children and young people. This knowledge is derived from a wealth of scientific and psychological studies and the clinical expertise of the broadest possible spectrum of researchers,clinicians and organisations in the field of child and family mental health
To present to professionals and parents, top international speakers, all of whom are involved in groundbreaking work with troubled children and young people. Over the years, hundreds of acclaimed child and family mental health professionals have presented lectures, trainings andworkshops at the Centre.

By fully drawing on the latest psychological and neuroscientific research studies worldwide, to make available to parents, teachers, child-care professionals, providers and custodians of services, politicians and the lay-public at large, a comprehensive up-to-date knowledge base in child and family mental health and wellbeing.
To fund an effective dissemination of psychologically and neurobiologically based research. Organisational isolation can be costly: wasting time slowly re-discovering what is already known
(Baron Peter Slade, 2000).

Dissemination of Research

To promote positive social change through disseminating the latest research in child, parent and family mental health
To make available to parents, teachers, child-care professionals, providers and custodians of services, politicians and the lay-public at large, a comprehensive up-to-date knowledge base in child and family well-being
To fund an effective dissemination of psychologically and neurobiologically based research. Organisational isolation can be costly: ...wasting time slowly re-discovering what is already known (Baron Peter Slade, 2000)

Networking and Communication

To provide a forum for discussion and debate, and to facilitate a dialogue between professionals and organisations in the field of child, parent and family mental health. This is with the hope that creative linking will stimulate the formulation and elaboration of new hypotheses that could generate vital research programmes.

Conference Chairs

Ellie Baker
Registered Integrative Child Psychotherapist, Senior Lecturer: MA Integrative Child Psychotherapy and Parent-Child Therapy (The Institute for Arts in Therapy and Education, London). Consultant and Trainer in Parenting and Communication Skills.

Brett Kahr
Senior Clinical Research Fellow in Psychotherapy and Mental Health, The Centre for Child Mental Health. Winnicott Clinic Senior Fellow in Psychotherapy. Visiting Clinician, Tavistock Centre for Couple Relationships. Past Director of The British Institute for Psychohistory. Author of many books on psychotherapy, including D.W. Winnicott, A Biographical Portrait (which received the Gradiva Award for Biography), Forensic Psychotherapy and Psychopathology: Winnicottian Perspectives and The Legacy of Winnicott: Essays on Infant and Child Mental Health.

Andrea Perry
Integrative Psychotherapist, and former Chairperson of the British Association of Dramatherapists. Her work on overcoming procrastination has been taken up by more than 80 UK universities. Author: Isn't It About Time? How to stop putting things off and get on with your life and The Little Book of Procrastination. Regular contributor to Psychologies magazine. Managing Director of Worth Publishing (www.worthreading.co.uk).

Roz Read
UKCP registered Integrative Child Psychotherapist. Working with adopted and fostered children and their families within Family Futures Consortium, a multi-disciplinary post-adoption support agency. Extensive experience of working with troubled children and young people in inner city schools and community settings.

Dr Margot Sunderland
Director of Education and Training at The Centre for Child Mental Health London, Honorary Visiting Fellow at London Metropolitan University, and Integrative Child Psychotherapist with over twenty years experience of working with children and families. She is the author of more than twenty books in the field of child mental health, published in nineteen countries. The Science of Parenting (Dorling Kindersley) won First Prize in the British Medical Association Medical Book awards 2007 (Popular Medicine section). The book is the result of over ten years intensive research on the long term effects of parent- child interaction on the brain. Margot is also Chief Executive and Founding Director of The Institute for Arts in Therapy and Education, a British accredited Higher and Independent Education College and academic partner of London Metropolitan University.