Monitoring

Monitoring

Monitoring Progress and Change

Keeping a close eye on the current state of services for young people is a critical part of RCY’s role and is one of our legal functions. Keeping government accountable for implementing the recommendations we make is a key aspect of this work, as is tracking the performance of child- and youth-serving systems overall.

Why Monitoring Matters

At RCY our ‘north star’ or vision of child well-being is that all children and youth in BC are well-supported across health, education, justice and social systems to ensure that they are safe, connected and thriving and that their fundamental rights are upheld. This means that we look across a broad range of programs, services and systems to see how young people are truly doing across many dimensions that helps us understand their well-being as a whole.

The number of children placed with relatives has increased more than

0 times

over the last 15 years, while those in government care have been reduced by half. This shift raises concerns about whether services and supports are keeping pace with the needs of children and families. Our monitoring work highlights trends over time and where services need to be strengthened.

– RCY Report, “Don’t Look Away” 2024

How We Do This Work

We monitor progress in change in systems of care for young people in a variety of ways, including analyzing data and research both externally and internally and connecting with young people, their families, service agencies and public bodies to gather qualitative and quantitative information about how our systems are performing and where  gaps that may impact many young people exist.

Kinship Carers Spotlight

An area where we have been monitoring change is that of kinship care or ‘out of  care’ arrangements. When a young person can’t live with their parents, they are often placed with extended family caregivers or close adult connections. RCY continues to hear concerns from caregivers about inadequate financial supports provided by the provincial government to meet their needs, inequities that have been underscored by our office’s own financial analysis. We continue to advocate through our work for more support for these important caregivers.

The Difference We Make

The systemic issues we identify through our monitoring work and recommendations we make for change help strengthen services and supports for young people. RCY’s monitoring work identifies systemic issues and includes recommendations for change. These reports are used by government and partners to inform decision-making and strengthen services and supports for children and youth.

“Government must be accountable for decisions that affect young people. We’re here to make that happen.”

– Dr. Jennifer Charlesworth,
Representative for Children and Youth