About Us
Sister System’s mission is to bridge the gap between care-affected girls and mainstream society by working alongside our ‘sisters’ to ensure they have the same opportunities everyone else has whether at home, in school, at work, and within our communities.
We provide a pathway to break through the many barriers faced by young women enabling them to fulfil their potential and become socio-economically mobile.
Our mission is to therefore demonstrate that we need to change how we work with care-affected children and to change the hearts and minds of local authorities and other services to provide the support these girls desperately need to improve their life chances.
In doing so, we demonstrate what a better model of support should look like - how it can offer better outcomes for our beneficiaries - and ultimately, how it can reduce the support required for the same girls as they become adults.
Best emerging voice charity of the year 2022
Sister System was established in 2017 as an Open College Network (OCN) approved centre and charitable organisation seeking to establish a new model of working with girls and young women who have been affected by the care system.
We work alongside young women aged 13-24 years old, providing an early intervention programme that aims to help them achieve a life free from abuse, with good positive mental health such that they are better equipped to engage in education and employment.
Sister System does this by providing intensive therapeutic mentoring, nationally accredited qualifications, workshops, access to a community of other sisters and career coaching over a period of up to nine years.
We build in each of us self-belief and meaningful relationships with each other setting a foundation for empowerment building towards socio-economic stability and a community of support that exists outside of the confines of an organisation.
We enable and empower these young women to value themselves and build lasting relationships in their personal lives, the workplace and within educational circles.
Meet the team
Sister System is led by a multi-disciplinary team with personal and professional experience and sector-specific knowledge from roles in education, mental health, the criminal justice system, social care, domestic violence and therapeutic disciplines.
Together, and alongside our board of Trustees, we fuse our acquired skills with our shared passion to enable, empower and enhance the life opportunities and outcomes for young women affected by looked after care.
This makes our approach utterly unique and completely essential.
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Celia Richards
Independent Domestic
Violence Advocate
Laura Marney
Director of Operations
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Jennifer McBurnie
Programmes Coordinator
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Sister System also calls upon the skill and talent of a pool of therapists, trainers, Assessors and an IQA to ensure that our programme delivery is dynamic and adapted to the needs of each cohort of Sisters.
Rachael Saunders
(Chair)
Why and where we exist
A preventative, early intervention provision based in Haringey, London. We work mostly across Haringey & Enfield but have service users pan London. Sister System exists as a new model of working with girls and young women, a model that puts them at the centre, cultivates their voice and empowers them!
These young women are among the most vulnerable and disenfranchised members of our communities, often on the fringes of society at risk of economic deprivation, social isolation, joblessness, homelessness, control and coercion with limited life prospects.
We aim to break the cycle of disadvantage, and develop a new model of life-changing support.
Our programmes aim to empower young women to achieve a life free from abuse with good mental health such that they can engage in education and employment. Working alongside them to support the development of positive mental health by increasing their emotional and mental resilience, social mobility and economic stability so that they are enabled to become self-reliant and independent.
Wellbeing and education are central to our holistic approach. We enable and empower these young women to value themselves and build lasting relationships in both their personal lives, education and workplaces. Our entire approach is informed by social pedagogy - a relationship-based way of working with children.
Our Key Principles for Success
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Early intervention support (girls from 13 years old can attend);
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Strong peer to peer support (workshops led by women with lived experience);
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Improve support at transitional points in young people’s lives (our age range ensures we can walk with them during key transitional points such as doing exams, leaving school, looking for their first job and leaving care);
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Long-term support - we offer support up to the age of 24 (we hope to engage beneficiaries in the long-term through offering a peer network they can remain part of, or to be able to join other Sister System activities).
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We assess the effectiveness of our programmes against our objectives through monitoring three main areas:
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Increased engagement in education and employment
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Increased understanding of healthy relationships
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Increased wellbeing and resilience