VISION 2020 UK Conference, 21st June 2007

Presentation by: Chris Beek, SEN National Adviser Team, DfES

The Development of Children’s Services

Change in the local authority environment

Introduction

Thank you for inviting me to be with you today and to be able to provide you with a short input on change to local authority services for children, young people and their families.

During the next ten minutes or so, I will aim to tell you a little about:

My role and the work of my team with local authorities.

Some of the key drivers for change and development, particularly, in this context, Removing Barriers to Achievement and Every Child Matters.

Some examples of change that we are seeing nationally.

The work of the National SEN Adviser Team

Our team was appointed three years ago to help local authorities to implement the Removing Barriers to Achievement, the Government’s strategy for SEN. There are currently five of on the team (3.4 full time equivalent posts) with each of us linked to one or more Government Office Region. The key priorities set out in RBA include:

Improving early intervention: both in terms of greater coordination between statutory services and through promoting reduced reliance on statements and greater delegated funding to support earlier intervention

Removing barriers to learning: through measures to increase the capacity of schools to meet SEN. It sets out arrangements to encourage increased support to mainstream schools to better meet needs including improved specialist services and a new role for special schools

Raising expectations and achievement: through focusing the work of the National Strategies to develop a framework for evidence based teaching. It also highlights the need to apply better progress and outcome measures that embrace all pupils including those working at P Levels:

Developing improvements in partnership: through the application of the Every Child Matters / Change for Children agenda and to bring greater coordination to support services.

As a team, we have visited all LAs in England at least three times using a standard agenda. We have developed an improved data set to monitor progress and have worked directly with LAs to support a range of relevant initiatives.

Progress

All LAs received a third visit between January and April of this year. Headline data and information from those visits indicates that:

Many local authorities have made significant organisational changes to support the introduction of integrated Children’s Services but not all change is yet embedded – I will return to this theme in a moment;

Services are becoming more responsive to the needs / voices of children, young people and their families;

Strategic planning for meeting SEN by local authorities has improved. Three years ago, many authorities could not demonstrate clear evidence-based plans for the development of provision and services for children and young people with SEN;

There is increasing clarity about the role and function of special schools and other specialist provision – increasingly LAs are able do describe their plans for the development of a ‘flexible range of provision’. Building Schools for the Future’ is providing the necessary capital investment to underpin these developments in many areas;

The National Strategies have produced some helpful materials – particularly ‘Leading on Inclusion’ and, for Key Stage 3, ‘Maximising progress; ensuring the attainment of pupils with SEN.’

There is evidence that the proportion of children failing to reach expected levels is reducing. For example, at the end of Key Stage 2 in 2006 6.1% of pupils did not achieve Level 3 or above in English. This represented a 1% improvement when compared with 2004.

Monitoring strategies for SEN have improved in the majority of local authorities and there is improved use of data. National data sets have improved nationally and this is reflected in the use of data by many local authorities and schools. It is now possible to closely monitor the progress of pupils and to evaluate the impact of strategies to support their learning.

Reliance on statements of special educational need has reduced. In 2006, some 1.98% of the 0-19 population held statements, down from 2.15% in 2001. We expect this number to fall a little further but for the proportion of children identified in their early years to continue to rise as early support approaches develop.

Investment has improved significantly. For example, planned expenditure on maintained special schools in England rose to 1.3bn in 2006-2007 (up from £1.08bn in 2003-2004). More significantly, planned expenditure on SEN in mainstream schools rose to £1.8bn in 2006-7 an increase of 61% when compared with 2002-2003 when comparable expenditure was approximately £1.1bn.

Every Child Matters / Change for Children

Earlier in this presentation I referred to organisational change at local authority level. During our visits this year we found that:

There has been considerable focus on developing and integrating services for children in their early years and their families. This has included the implementation of Early Support – improving access to services, the integration of services and the development of key working where children face significant difficulties.

A good example of this is the Early Support Service in Bromley. This was a pathfinder LA and it provides a single point of referral for the borough. Services may be provided through Children’s Centres or, for pupils with the most complex needs, through the Phoenix Specialist Children’s Centre. This is co-located on Health premises with a fully integrated workforce. All children with complex needs and their families are assigned Key Workers who are able to coordinate case managementand support arrangements. Information sharing between professionals is also well developed. Fewer children require statements. Evaluation has been very positive. This initiative can be characterised as a ‘team around child’ approach and is an increasingly common approach to providing early years services.

For older children, typically, developments are not so far advanced or embedded. We have seen the development of plans for ‘team around the school’ approaches where integrated services are aligned to ExtendedSchool clusters with at least one school in each cluster developing a range of extended services.

For example, in Norfolk, Children’s Services have recently been reorganised into new areas aligned to both PCTs and district council boundaries. Each area will have at least one special school that will act as a hub for the provision of services for children and young people with disabilities and their families. Within each of these areas, localities have been identified based upon clusters of schools. Each locality will have access to a range of services and specialist provision. The staff of the local authority have been reorganised into new integrated teams under the leadership of an area manger.

Similarly, in Haringey in London, Children’s Services Partnership Areas have been established, based on groups of schools, and services are being aligned to these.

Generally, we have found that healthcare professionals are well engaged with these developments.

Whilst many changes are currently being implemented, some early Pathfinder authorities provide examples of what can be achieved through integrated working.

The London Borough of Redbridge provides another example of progress. Redbridge was a Children’s Trust Pathfinder authority and arrangements for the delivery of integrated services are well established. Indeed most services are now provided through these trust arrangements. Commissioning is well established and, for example, all outreach services are now commissioned from local special schools with the exception of support for pupils with visual impairments which are commissioned from the neighbouring borough of WalthamForest. The recent Joint Area Review concluded:

’Services are effectively integrated and the expansion of the Children’s Trust is helping to improve outcomes for children and young people ….. The impact of local services in helping children and young people to enjoy their education and recreation and to achieve well is good. The quality of support to ensure good provision in schools is outstanding. The support for children and young people with learning difficulties and or disabilities is very good and they achieve well.’ (JAR 2007)

In conclusion

We have seen significant progress but there is more still to do, particularly in:

Continuing to build capacity with a focus on progress and outcomes for all children and young people

Improving the confidence of parents in the education that their children receive

Embedding many of the very significant changes that have taken place over the last five years in the development of integrated Children’ Services.

Presentation by: Megan Barley/Kay Wrench, VIEW

A Vision for Children

Working with Children with Vision Impairment in a Mainstream Setting

Kay and I are members of the VIEW executive and that is why we are here today. This gives us a national perspective on the role of teachers of the visually impaired. Our ‘day job’ is working with children and young people with visual impairment at the ‘coal face’ in their neighbourhood schools. We are also part of the North West VI Heads Consortium, which meets termly to discuss strategic issues affecting the education of VI children. In this group we also have people from RNIB, NBCS and Henshaws, and one of the special schools for VI in the North West. In addition Kay and I both belong to our local LVSC group, and this enables us to get a wider understanding of the needs of all people with a VI in our area. We are both members of the National LVSC Children’s Group and the VISION 2020 UK National Children’s Group.

We must remember that the majority of children and young people with visual impairment are successfully supported in their mainstream schools. A few attend special schools for children and young people with visual impairment. These schools are without a doubt part of the continuum of provision for these children, but the children are often there, not because they cannot be supported educationally in their local authorities, but because they have other needs - which may be more to do with parents wishes or additional needs, such as autism. Sometimes it is because the local authority does not have enough staff to meet the needs of the children with visual impairment within the authority.

Situations where parents are dissatisfied with their children’s provision in local authority settings may lead to tribunal - and hit the headlines, but we do not often hear from the very many well satisfied parents whose children have a positive experience throughout their educational careers in the mainstream setting.

As we know visual impairment is a low incidence disability in the true meaning of low incidence. There are very few children and young people with visual impairment in any one authority compared to children with other additional needs, and so they may come low on the agenda of local authority’s Children’s Directorates.

How do Local Authorities support Children and Young People in their mainstream schools?

As we have heard local authority services for children have changed dramatically over the last couple of years, with Education services combining with Social Services to form Children’s Directorates. Future plans come into operation by 2008 so Health services are also included - forming Children’s Trusts.

We have to be aware and use all the initiatives the Government throws at us. Removing Barriers to Achievement charges authorities to look at services for all children with additional needs. We also have to consider the directives contained in Every Child Matters.

No doubt there is a post-code lottery. Most authorities provide an excellent service - meeting the needs of the children with visual impairment in their care. Others do not fund services for visually impaired pupils well enough and the teachers of the visually impaired in these authorities are in a ‘no win’ situation – and they just cannot meet the needs of the children.

No two local authorities are the same. Some services for visually impaired pupils are separate from all other services, some are in a service with teachers of hearing impaired as a sensory service, and sometimes the team for visually impaired is part of a much bigger department.

Most authorities have a service which has a number of teachers of the visually impaired. Most authorities still fund their services centrally, even though most money is delegated to schools – because there are so few children with visual impairment - and they are not spread evenly around the authority. Likewise, although many authorities are splitting teams into localities, most authorities are allowing their children’s teams for visual impairment to remain as a discreet team feeding into the locality teams as appropriate.

Some authorities have a service which is mainly advisory; others are teaching services, where teachers of the visually impaired work directly with children and young people. Children and young people with a visual impairment may be in the mainstream setting or they may be in local special schools for children with additional needs such as severe learning difficulty, moderate learning difficulty or autism - and teachers of the visually impaired work in all of these settings.

Teachers of the visually impaired are a highly skilled group of people; unfortunately they are at the whim of many people – the Government, the Local Authority, the schools they work in, and this can make their task more even more difficult. We must be pro-active and we must work to an integrated national programme which reduces the effect of the post-code lottery.

So …. Why are most children and young people with visual impairment educated in their local authority?

They can go to school with their brothers, sisters and friends.

They will not have to travel long distances in a taxi or minibus.

They can live at home with their families.

So I will hand you over to Kay who will tell you what a Teacher of the Visually Impaired actually does….

Presentation by Barbara Raybould, NBCS

Researching Children's Needs and Opportunities for Partnership Working

Introduction

NBCS

  • Providing 5 key services
  • Developing National VI Educational Advocacy Partnership

After discussions with Futurebuilders England, goverment backed investment fund supporting voluntary organisations to deliver public services NBCS was awarded Futurebuilders England Development Grant to:-

  • Explore the opportunites for NBCS and partner voluntary organisations to provide specialist services to Local Authorities and Children’s Trusts for children with VI and their families

Methodology

Quantitative and qualitative research involving:-

  • Children, young people and their families
  • Professionals working with them
  • Representatives from Local Authority/Children’s Trusts
  • Representatives from voluntary organisations

Through:-

  • Literature review of impact of VI on educational and social inclusion
  • Analysis of current legislation, initiatives and research findings including ECM, EDCM, Steps to Independence, Shaping the Future, West Midlands Social Inclusion project
  • Analysis of current context including increased delegation to schools
  • Focused interviews with children, families and a range of professionals working with them
  • Analysis of questionnaires for families
  • Analysis of questionnaires for Local Authorities/Children’s Trusts
  • Analysis of referrals to NBCS
  • And comparison with other research carried out by RLSB and SERSEN Partnership

The data and evidence showed:-

  • The need for high quality and specialised support for children and families from the point of diagnosis onwards and into adulthood
  • The difficulties experienced by families in finding out about and accessing supportive services
  • Parental concern for under-developed independence and social skills and resulting low self esteem and vulnerability
  • Difficulties in providing comprehensive services in such a low incidence disability by individual Local Authorities /Children’s Trusts in a climate of increased delegation to schools
  • The willingness of Local Authorities/Children’s Trusts to work with the voluntary sector to build local capacity, to address gaps in provision and to enable children to achieve full educational and social inclusion
  • Examples of successful and cost effective partnership working between Local Authorities/Children’s Trusts and the voluntary sector
  • Key areas of potential partnership working including family support, the development of independence and social skills, provision of leisure, sports and holiday activites and mobility training

Some detailed findings:-

  • Nearly 70% of parents were concerned about independence and social skills but only 24% received any direct support in this area. 61% of families did not know where to find this support.
  • 50% of Local Authorities/Children’s Trusts expressed an interest in partnership working with NBCS and partner organisations on developing independence and social skills with a further 29% interested in mobility training
  • 57% of parents were concerned about opportunities for sports,leisure and holiday activities but only 26% received such services
  • 67% of Local Authorities were interested in partnership working with NBCS and partner organisations in this area
  • 88% felt that funding issues were a major barrier to working in partnership as the vast majoriy of funds are delegated directly to schools. Most present joint working is supported by short term grants or charity funds. Mechanisms for ommissioning of services from the voluntary sector is not yet well developed and services already provided to local authorities by voluntary organisations tend to be funded through service level agreements or grants.
  • Many families needed more than one of the key services from NBCS and often came back again and again for support as the child’s needs changed
  • Many families felt their children were well supported educationally by their Authority’s Visual impairment Service and the VI teacher was often a ‘keyworker’ for the child putting the family in touch with other services including VI charities . Parents felt that the additional services needed were often outside the remit of ‘education’ but were not provided by any other Local Authority service.
  • Nearly 50% of families said they needed family support, advice and information or educational advocacy but only 25% of families received these services.
  • 50% of Local Authorities/Children’s Trusts said they were interested in partnership working with NBCS and partner organisations in these areas and several mentioned specialist advocacy services, giving further evidence for the need for the National VI Educational Advocacy Partnership
  • 100% of Local Authorities expressed a desire to work in partnership with NBCS and other voluntary organisations

The report will form the basis of applications for funding to:-