December 9, 2014: Homelessness campaigner Fr. Peter McVerry has encouraged greater use of Restorative Practices, as a measure to tackle homelessness. Speaking at the launch of two Restorative Practice reports in Dublin today, Fr. McVerry said that greater use of restorative practice in disadvantaged families, communities and in schools would help to prevent homelessness. “Homelessness […]
Profile of Tallaght West from 2011 Census
December 2014: The 2011 Census is the most recent detailed population profile taken of Tallaght West. Using the figures we can compare Tallaght West against national averages using a range of established social and economic indicators. Tallaght West in the data which follows is defined as the electoral division areas of Ballinascorney, Fettercain, Jobstown, Killinarden and Kiltipper. […]
Realising Real-World Research: Research and Evaluation in Challenging Times
November 2014: Knowledge exchange is not easy. While researchers know the language of research there is no guarantee they know the language of either practice or policy making. For an introduction on how best to break through the communication barriers across different professional groups you should access the presentations from the recent knowledge exchange conference […]
Building a knowledge base of the process of Replication
November 2014: When we try to bring about change, we often look at what others have already tried to do about the problem. People working in social fields have thought about how this for a long time. Many different terms are used to describe it: knowledge transfer, dissemination, diffusion, replication, scaling up, going to scale. […]
Further Restorative Practice Primary Schools launched in Tallaght West
October 6, 2014: Two Primary Schools in Tallaght, St. Mark’s Junior and St. Mark’s Senior in Springfield, have been launched as ‘Restorative Practice Schools’. The announcement follows three other Tallaght Primary Schools Scoil Cnoc Mhuire Junior and Senior and Scoil Chaitlín Maude which were launched as ‘Restorative Practice Schools’ earlier this year. Restorative Practices (RP) […]
Challenges and Fun: Putting Doodle Den online
September 2014: After our first project meeting with The Tallaght West Childhood Development Initiative (CDI) we arrived back at our offices in Dublin City Centre armed with a 484 page long programme manual and a brief to make an online literacy learning support tool for senior infants. Well, it’s a good job we like a […]
CDI Wins Communications Award
The Tallaght based Childhood Development Initiative (CDI) has won a top award for its communications at this years Public Relations Institute of Ireland industry awards. CDI received its Award from An Taoiseach Enda Kenny at a gala awards ceremony. CDI, working together with the agency Cavanagh Communications, won the title of Best Corporate Communication in […]
Limerick Kids Graduate with Improved Literacy Skills
July 6, 2014: 90 kids from Limerick today celebrated improved literacy skills after completing an intensive early years intervention programme. The children worked hard since last September completing three hour-and-a-half long after-school sessions each week, as part of the Doodle Den programme which took place in six Primary Schools in Limerick city. The Senior Infants […]
Report says early intervention makes economic and moral sense
July 6, 2014: Greater use of approaches which prevent or tackle social problems early will save money and result in better outcomes for more young people and families, a network of 24 organisations has stated. Launching a report by Independent Social Researcher Brian Harvey, the Prevention and Early Intervention Network (PEIN) said that both Irish […]
Childhood Development Initiative launched as Restorative Organisation
June 27, 2014: The Childhood Development Initiative (CDI) was launched as a ‘restorative organisation’ at its annual summer barbecue. This means that all CDI staff have been trained, its HR policies and way of working all reflect the principles of Restorative Practice. Restorative Practice involves training people in skills of communicating with each other that are […]