Agenda and minutes

To receive any apologies for absence.

Apologies for absence were received from Councillors Ashraf, W Gill, and Mayo and Barrie Scott Co-opted Member - Church of England dioceses of Birmingham and Lichfield Representative.

Members to declare any interests in matters to be discussed at the meeting.

There were no declarations of interest.

To confirm the minutes of the meeting held on 11 September 2023 as a correct record.

Resolved that the minutes of the meeting held on 11 September 2023 are approved as a correct record.

To determine whether there are any additional items of business to be considered as a matter of urgency.

There were no additional items of business to consider. 

To consider post 16 pathways.

The Board received an update on the post 16 pathways available to young people in Sandwell. The period of transition from full time education to post 18 destinations was important to help guide young people to achieve their aspirations. Education, Employment and Training figures had been generally good in Sandwell for those young people aged 16-18, however, post 19 figures had raised challenges.

The Board noted the following key headlines:-

·      the Council had a statutory duty to provide targeted careers support for vulnerable young people;

·      Sandwell Connexons was the team responsible for delivering the service in Sandwell which supported vulnerable groups including those young people involved in the youth justice system, those with attendance issues, Children in Care, those with SEND and those with family issues;

·      since the raising of the participation age in education, the monitoring of post 16 outcomes had become an important aspect of Sandwell Connexions focus; 

·      the September guarantee meant there was a statutory duty for Connexions to return data on the placements of those young people aged 16-18;

·      for 2022/23 1.7% of young people were Not in Education, Employment or Training (NEET) , this was an improvement over the 202122 figure of 2.6%;

·      Sandwell ranked in Quintile 1 in the Country for its 16-18 NEET figures, which equated to 7^th in the Country;

·      the figures for September 2023 demonstrated Sandwell was ahead of the national and regional average;

·      in August 2022 87.3% of Sandwell’s young people in care aged 16 in Employment, Education or Training (EET), this had improved and in August 2023 it was 90.6%;

·      the percentage of care leavers aged 17 and 18 in EET had been 60% in August 2022 and 71% in August 2023;

·      the percentage of care leavers aged 19-21 in EET had been 44.5% in August 2022 and 48.6% in August 2023, this was below the England (62%) and West Midlands (60%) average;

·      the percentage of those young people with SEND who were NEET was less than the West Midlands (9.4%) and England (9.7) average at 8.3%;

·      the specialist EET support for children in care and care leavers included:

o   bespoke Sandwell Connexions Career advice and guidance programme from year 8 to year 11;

o   access to the aspire to higher education programme;

o   a NEET panel allowed social workers to refer young people towards career advice and support;

o   ringfenced apprenticeship opportunities across the Council and Sandwell Children’s Trust;

o   the employment and skills team building a bond with care leavers to support them in accessing opportunities.

·       the specialist EET support for young people with SEND included:

o   Connexions advice and guidance;

o   those with an Education, Health and Care Plan (EHCP) would be supported up to the age of 25;

o   supported internships where those with SEND were given a work placement;

o   supported apprenticeships which was aimed to follow any internship;

o   the support of a specialist employment team to support those with SEND.

·      since 2021/22 there had been 2070 apprenticeships started;

·      the take  ...  view the full minutes text for item 40/23

To consider Sandwell Virtual School responsibilities and outcomes.

Sandwell Virtual School aimed to promote achievement, raise attainment and ensure equality of opportunity and to enhance the life chances of all Children in Care.

The Virtual School Head was the lead responsible officer for

ensuring that schools had the arrangements in place to improve the

educational experiences and outcomes of the authority's

Looked After Children, including those placed out-of-borough.

The Board noted the following key headlines:-

·      Sandwell Virtual School for Children in Care had an intentionally high expectation for children so that they were given every opportunity to access the very best education possible and achieve their potential;

·      a dedicated team comprising of a headteacher, operations manager, advisory teachers and support workers provided support to those children and young people in care;

·      Ofsted had made repeated positive statements on the Sandwell Virtual School including:

o   “the virtual school has high expectations for children in care”

o   “[the children in care] are well supported and make progress in their education and learning”

o   “Children have access to a range of social and educational opportunities”

·      Nationally there were around 82,000 children in care which continued to increase and was expected to reach 100,000 by 2035;

·      the most common reason for children to move into care was - at risk of abuse or neglect – which accounted for 54,270 children (66% of all cases);

·      males accounted for 56% of the cohort, compared to 51% in the overall child population in Sandwell;

·      Children in Care were predominantly older aged 10-15 years old and accounted for 39% of children, those aged 5-9 years were 18%, those 1-4 years 14% and those less than 1 year old 5%;

·      The Virtual School was responsible for 503 children;

·      approximately 48% of Sandwell children in care attended school outside of Sandwell, with 93% attending schools in and within 20 miles of Sandwell;

·      of the schools attended by children in care:

o   16 percent of the overall Children in Care cohort attended an education setting rated ‘outstanding’ by Ofsted;

o   88% percent attended an education setting that was Ofsted-rated ‘good or outstanding’;

o   only 1 percent of the cohort attended a setting judged to be ‘inadequate’ by Ofsted;

o   children attending inadequate schools were provided with additional support;

·      Pupil Premium came directly to the Virtual School. Based on the Personal Education Plan of each child, the funding was then moved to the child’s educational setting;

·      Virtual School retained a proportion of that funding where it provided a creative curriculum which included:

o   arts and crafts day;

o   film making workshop;

o   Easter arts festival and theatre performance;

o   an introduction to acting at the Wolverhampton Grand Theatre;

o   a prosthetics workshop.

·      a joint Aspire to University programme was run across the wider Black Country:

o   Sandwell had the highest proportion of students in the programme;

o   those children on the scheme were identified in year 6 and they were worked with to encourage them;

o   there were 129 young people across years 8-13 on the programme;  ...  view the full minutes text for item 41/23

To consider the ASEND Inspection Outcome and Next Steps.

The Board received an update on the ASEND Inspection conducted by Ofsted and he Care Quality Commission (CQC) between 19 June and 7 July 2023. The inspection evaluated against the new Ofsted and CQC inspection framework which was launched in January 2023.

The revised framework evaluated the effectiveness and impact of local area partners and the extent to which children and young people with SEND, including those who attended Alternative Provision, were receiving consistently good experiences leading to consistently good outcomes.

While the inspection had been positive, the inspection had found that children and young people with SEND, and those who attended Alternative Provision, received inconsistent experiences leading to them achieving inconsistent outcomes in Sandwell. This was referred to as a ‘category 2’ outcome for the local area partnership.

A category 2 outcome meant that the local area partnership would

submit to routine monitoring by Ofsted and CQC and supported by the Department for Education (DfE) in making the necessary improvements and within agreed timeframes. Following the inspection, all local areas were required to publish a local area inclusion plan by 2024. Sandwell would be publishing theirs ahead of the deadline set by the DfE.

The three areas for improvement noted by Ofsted and CQC were:

·      area leaders should strengthen multi-agency working across the partnership between education, health and social care, so that children and young people’s needs were identified and assessed in a more efficient and timely manner;

·      area leaders should develop co-production with children and young people with SEND at a strategic level so that children and young people played a key role in developing improvement strategies and plans;

·      area leaders should increase the number and range of short break opportunities to support the needs of all children and young people with SEND, including those with complex needs and post-16 young people.

The recommendations would be taken on board and actioned, which included incorporating them within the local area inclusion plan.

The inspectors were highly complementary about the renewed energy and vision shared across the partnership for children and young people with SEND, and the new SEND eco-system transformation programme launched by the local area partnership in June 2023. This had given the inspectors a very clear understanding that the local area partners, through the self-evaluation, were accurate in their judgements and the actions they were taking to improve the experiences and outcomes of children and young people with SEND.

The senior leaders of the Sandwell local area partnership for SEND were pleased that the inspection was both developmental and helpful and confirmed the accurate self-evaluation of the partnership.

Following comments and questions from members of the Board, the following responses were provided and issues highlighted:-

·      the placement of children and young people with SEND out of Borough was to do with the needs of those individuals; local authorities nationally were not in a position to meet the needs of every child within their boundary and therefore were required to place and educate some children out of Borough  ...  view the full minutes text for item 42/23

Standing item to consider and note progress on implementation of actions and recommendations.

The Board noted progress on actions and recommendations from previous meetings.

Standing item to consider the Children’s Services and Education Work Programme and future items on the Forward Plan.

The Board noted the Cabinet Forward Plan as it related to Children, Young People and Education.