Senior Research Fellow in Contextual Safeguarding

I have been a teacher and researcher for more than 30 years within the UK Higher Education sector, working in Liverpool, Glasgow, Nottingham, London and Manchester.

My early career was focused within critical criminology, following completion of a Masters in criminology and I worked on a series of diverse research projects related to the ideological representation of crime and deviance, especially related to gender violence and sexual crimes.

From the mid 1990s I concentrated my research interests around policy developments on child sexual exploitation and worked between 2004-2007 on secondment to Barnardo’s UK Research & Development Unit, whilst continuing to lecture at my University in London. Following a career break in 2014, I joined the Contextual Safeguarding Team at University of Bedfordshire in 2019.

Qualifications

• MA (Dist.) Crime, Deviance and Social Policy – Lancaster University
• BA (Hons) Applied Social Sciences – Lancaster University

Teaching Expertise

• Unit Coordinator ‘Contextual Safeguarding: Theoretical foundations and practical implications’
• Masters level Contextual Safeguarding tutoring, lecturing & administration

Research Interests

• Contextual safeguarding in youth and voluntary sector settings
• Contextual safeguarding in school/education settings
• Contextual safeguarding and SEND children/young people
• Media & cultural representation of CSE, CCE and gender violence

Projects

• ‘Youth Now’ Oldham (Positive Steps/Oldham Council) – pilot project to develop contextual safeguarding within the youth justice service
• ‘Out There: Rescue & Response’ (MOPAC, London) – three-year evaluation of a pan-London safeguarding response to CCE/’county lines’
• ‘Beyond Referrals - VCS’ – project to develop a contextual safeguarding toolkit for use in sports, youth & community settings.

Publications

• Scott, S. & Skidmore, P. (2006) Reducing the Risk; Barnardo’s support for sexually exploited young people – A Two Year Evaluation (Barnardo’s, Barkingside).
• Lillywhite, R. & Skidmore, P. (2006) ‘Boys are not sexually exploited? A challenge to practitioners’ Child Abuse Review Vol. 15, Issue 5, pp351 – 361.
• Skidmore, P. (2006) ‘Blueprints of Experience; working to prevent and reduce child sexual exploitation in the UK, Netherlands & Estonia’; Report to the Agis Programme 2004-6, European Commission; Barnardo’s, Barkingside.
• Skidmore, P. (2004) ‘What works in child sexual exploitation: sharing and learning’ Report to the Daphne Programme 2000-03, European Commission; Barnardo’s, Barkingside.
• Skidmore, P. (1998) ‘Gender and the News Agenda; The reporting of child sexual abuse’ in Carter,C., Branston,G. & Allan,S. (eds.) News Gender and Power (Routledge).
• Kitzinger, J. & Skidmore, P. (1995) 'Playing Safe? Media Coverage of Child Sexual Abuse Prevention Strategies' Child Abuse Review, Vol. 3, Issue 4, pp47- 56.
• Skidmore, P. (1995) 'Telling Tales; Media Power, Ideology and the Reporting of Child Sexual Abuse’ in Kidd-Hewitt, D. and Osborne, R. (eds.) Crime and Media; The Post-Modern Spectacle (Pluto Press), pp78-107
• Harrop, S., Skidmore, P. & Woodcock, G. (1995) A Sound Education? Adult Education and Local Radio, (University of Liverpool Press)
• Scraton, P. Sim, J. & Skidmore, P. (1990) Prisons Under Protest: Penal Policy and Long-Term Imprisonment in Scotland (Open University Press)

Contact Details

T: +44 (0)7544657608
E: paula.skidmore@beds.ac.uk