(a)

the focus for Pledge 41 was linked to children and young people in care that the council was responsible for, in order to encourage more people to remain living in their own communities, where possible, other than using institutional placements;

(b)

Pledge 47 focused upon the promotion of fostering and adoption in Plymouth with a renewed campaign; this campaign had been completed however it was highlighted that there were continued efforts to attract new foster carers for the city’s children;

(c)

Pledge 40, regarding raising school standards, and Pledge 42, regarding the introduction of a fair system to take an annual holiday without penalty, were both linked as school attendance rates were seen to impact achievement – a consultation regarding school attendance was due to go out in the public domain shortly and information from this would be submitted to scrutiny in September 2019;

(d)

there was an ongoing task to identify young carers that were not currently registered with the Council.

(a)

the inclusion of this report to the Education and Children’s Social Care Overview and Scrutiny Panel was as a result of a recommendation from a Motion that went to Full Council in March 2019;

(b)

the introduction of the National Funding Formula from 2018/19 was an attempt by Local Government to address historic inequities in funding for schools; Plymouth’s Schools Block had increased from £143.056m  in 2017/18 to £149.550, in 2018/19 however Plymouth was still receiving  £283 less per pupil than the national average;

(c)

despite the challenges none of the maintained schools in Plymouth were forecasting a deficit position at the end of 2019/20 financial year; whilst this was positive news there was a desire to understand what actions schools had taken to balance their budgets;

(a)

the Elective Home Education support service was delivered by the ACE Multi Academy Trust who held the register of children who were electively home educated; ACE Multi Academy Trust monitored the curriculum and the delivery of home education however there was no requirement for families to register but this was encouraged. This contract was due to end in August 2019 and the monitoring and oversight of home education would be the responsibility of Plymouth City Council;

(b)

Electively Home Educated (EHE) pupils were also monitored through a Local Authority register; appropriate action was taken where it appeared that an EHE pupil was not receiving suitable education;

(c)

the Department for Education was conducting a consultation in relation to establishing a local authority registration system for children who did not attend state-funded or registered independent schools;

(d)

the Home Education Bill had its third reading at the House of Commons on 24 July 2018 – the outcomes was the withdrawal of the Bill at this point in the process however the Department for Education subsequently launched a Call for Evidence regarding children not in school. This call for evidence incorporated elective home education as a theme.  This call for evidence closed on 24th June 2019 and officers were awaiting the outcome with regard to the impact for children who were electively home educated;

(e)

Officers considered that parents should be given a two week cooling-off period once they have withdrawn their child from school – this would provide officers with a short window of opportunity to work with parents to find out possible resolutions to problems. Officers also suggested that a child who had withdrawn from school should be able to return to school up to a six month period after they had withdrawn to make it easier for them to return to the formal education system.

(f)

there was currently a voluntary registration system for home education therefore it was not known how many children had only ever been home educated as parents were not required to notify the Local Authority;

(g)

a significant number of those who had elected to be home educated had given the reason for this choice to be ‘other’ on the questionnaire instead of  specifying why – it was considered that this was because it was a lifestyle choice and they had elected not to be a part of the local authority education system;

(h)

the school was required to notify the local authority if a child had been removed from a school setting to instead be electively home educated;

(i)

schools were working closely with the Council to recognise and reduce pupil movement, specifically with regards to elective home education;

(j)

from the  ...  view the full minutes text for item 16.

(a)

a sample of 415 of the current open cases referred to an Education Welfare Officer had been reviewed by Officers; within this sample, 5% of the cases cited bullying as a reason for persistent absence;

(b)

schools were required by law to act to prevent bullying and also to address it if it happened; the Department for Education (DfE) had produced guidance for all schools which outlined their duty towards preventing and tackling bullying:

www.gov.uk/government/publications/preventing-and-tackling-bullying

(c)

the Education Reference Group (Safeguarding) had identified that the way in which the software used to monitor bullying (CPOMS) was inconsistent therefore a piece of work was underway to develop best practice guidance for schools to use this software and form part of best practice guidance;

(d)

Plymouth City Council had a webpage which provided advice around bullying and signposted to support services and was improving the Plymouth Online Directory to enhance the information available;

(e)

Officers were continuing to work with families and schools to properly support them and had recently sent a letter to Plymouth Head Teachers requesting data in relation in absence.

(f)

there was no single route for parents to report bullying to the local authority;

(g)

the Plymouth Online Directory was  advertised on the Council’s website and included on the bottom of letterheads.

1.

recommend to Officers to extend an invitation to both a Primary and Secondary Head Teacher to attend a future Education and Children’s Social Care Overview and Scrutiny Committee in order to advise Members on how they react to bullying within their schools;

2.

recommend to Officers to explore the feasibility of inviting a parent whose child had been bullied to a future Education and Children’s Social Care Overview and Scrutiny Committee in order to share their experiences;

3.

would hear from Mrs Nicky Williams (Parent Governor Representative) at a future scrutiny committee regarding a case of bullying she was aware of which she could share with Members.

(a)

the 110 Club consisted of representation from several council departments, a wide range of partners including Barnardos, the Virtual School Team and a Head Teacher;

(b)

it was recognised through analysis that work experience for young people and the planning for it needed to happen much earlier in order to engage children and offer them the correct support to develop their skills;

(c)

17% of care leavers between the ages of 18-25 years old were NEET (not in education, employment of training) because of ill health or disability;

(d)

the Care Journeys work with Barnados focused upon achieving outcomes for care leavers; the programme included volunteering opportunities. One Plymouth was also working to create a system for volunteers to easily identify what opportunities were available.

(a)

Ofsted Improvement Plan – to be discussed on 11 September 2019;

(b)

Child Exploitation – to be discussed on 11 September 2019 (for Members to be provided with the scope of child exploitation and include information upon cyber issues, modern slavery and the framework for the multi-agency group);

(c)

Education and Skills Strategy – refresh (date not specified);

(d)

Plymouth Challenge Update - to be discussed on 11 September 2019;

(e)

New Ofsted Framework – (impact on the inspection framework) to be discussed on 13 November 2019;

(f)

School Attendance Consultation - to be discussed on 11 September 2019 (to include data regarding achievement levels in schools);

(g)

Fair Funding for Schools – Select Review (to assess the impact of the National Funding Formula (NFF) upon Plymouth schools, with particular attention upon the impact on staffing reduction including teaching assistants, the increase in class sizes, collapsing the school day and concerns schools have for the children over the city);

(h)

Elective Home Education (DFE consultation results to be added to the work programme for discussion in the Autumn with reference to the Inclusion and Attendance Strategy);

(i)

progress report on Care Leavers and NEET (Pledge 48) would be scheduled on the panel’s work programme for 6 months’ time (8 January 2020);

(j)

Failure to Reduce Health Inequalities - this was an amber risk on the Strategic Risk Register (for an action plan and future mitigations to be provided to Members)