This section outlines the different ways in which a friendship and peer assessment can be triggered.
There are several ways to trigger a peer assessment. Understanding what has triggered the assessment will help you define the parameters of your work.
A panel/ meeting to discuss extra-familial harm might identify themes about places where young people are vulnerable to harm. This can lead to questions about what is happening in that context and trigger a context assessment focused on a friendship/ peer group.
During other assessments, young people may be identified as being at risk together. This could be during an individual assessment, if a young person’s peer connections have been identified as needing separate attention, or during a neighbourhood assessment when a focus on a particular friendship/ peer group is identified.
Several practitioners may have pulled cumulative information over time about a connected group of young people that warrants an assessment.