THE EDUCATION SYSTEM
The Children's Safeguards Review
5.1 Education forms a large part of the Children's Safeguards Review. The main issues raised were:
- welfare inspections of independent boarding schools under Section 87 of the Children Act 1989 should be extended to all schools with boarding provision
- corporal punishment should be banned for all pupils
- all organisations caring for children away from home should provide parents with relevant information about their arrangements for safeguarding children
- Government should sponsor a programme to inform parents and relevant staff about the risks to the welfare of children living away from home and about ways of reducing them
- payment of the Boarding School Allowance by the Ministry of Defence to service families should be conditional on parents seeking advice on prospective schools from the Service Children's Education Agency
- welcome for the Government's proposal to review the registration system for independent schools
- approved independent special schools should set up governing bodies similar to those in maintained and non-maintained special schools, with a duty for safeguarding and promoting pupil welfare
- local authorities should unify their educational and social services arrangements for assessing and supporting children with emotional and learning difficulties and their families
- action needed to be taken to ensure the educational needs of looked after children were met in the light of their poor educational outcomes.
The Government's response
5.2 The Department for Education and Employment and the Welsh Office consulted on the Review's education recommendations. The majority of responses supported them. The Government welcomes and accepts in principle most of the recommendations.
Schools with Boarding Provision
5.3 Ban of corporal
punishment in all schools
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5.3 Enhancement of
Service Children's
Education Agency
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5.3 Action is being taken forward on the following:
- the School Standards and Framework Act 1998 outlaws corporal punishment for privately-funded pupils in independent schools, from 1 September 1999. The effect of this will be to ban the use of corporal punishment for all pupils in schools, both maintained and independent
- to achieve the "elevation of all boarding schools to the high standards of the best" as recommended by the Review a combination of legislation training programmes and guidance will be needed. To start, we will develop guidance and support training programmes for boarding staff; and promote guidance to parents on the welfare standards they should look for when they are choosing a school
- the Teaching and Higher Education Act 1998 gives the new General Teaching Councils (GTC) for England and Wales the power to take disciplinary measures against teachers on the grounds of unacceptable professional conduct or serious professional incompetence. Cases involving the safety and welfare of children will continue to be determined by the Secretary of State. The Secretary of State will take the GTC's advice in cases involving registered teachers (in Wales, the Secretary of State's responsibilities will transfer to the new National Assembly from mid 1999)
- the Ministry of Defence carried out a wide ranging review of the administration of the Admissible Schools List. This concluded that the advisory role of the Service Children's Education Agency should be enhanced and all claimants required to certify that they are aware that advice is available, or has been obtained, from the Agency. This will be implemented.
Additionally, it has been decided that, from 1 September 1999, schools will be included on their Admissible Schools List (to be renamed Accredited schools Database) only if they are members of an organisation affiliated to the Independent Schools Council or are in the maintained sector, or are governed by an appropriate professional or vocational organisation, and which, having been inspected under a DfEE (or similar) approved regime, agree to the inspection report being placed in the public domain. Revised arrangements will also be introduced for removing schools from the List when they fail to continue to meet the criteria, or when a Notice of Complaint is issued. Parents who choose to keep their children at such a school will jeopardise their entitlement to educational allowances
- welfare inspection reports made under Section 87 of the Children Act 1989 will be extended to apply to all schools with boarding accommodation
- new arrangements will be introduced for taking simpler and faster action against schools which fail on welfare grounds.
5.4 Other Review recommendations on which the Government is agreed and will be developing implementation plans include:
- ensuring that all boarding schools have appropriate formal complaints procedures (this may be taken forward as part of the Section 87 inspections)
- improving the process of Section 87 welfare inspection reports by ensuring they are reader-friendly, widely available and that responsibility for following up the recommendations is clear
- consulting early next year on the proposal to require approved independent schools to have governing bodies
- encouraging individual independent schools to include information about welfare safeguards in their brochures and the Independent Schools Information Service (ISIS) in their guide to choosing an independent school.
5.5 Response to our consultation on the Review's recommendations showed that there would be difficulties in requiring schools with more than 10% of children from overseas to have welfare inspections annually instead of every four years. This is firstly because the proportions of overseas pupils can fluctuate from year to year. Secondly, they do not appear to be directly correlated with the degree of welfare risk. Annual inspections of all schools over the threshold would also cost more. The frequency of inspections depends upon the apparent risks to pupils' welfare. The Government will ensure that the spirit of this recommendation is met by the frequency of inspections being appropriate to the vulnerability of the young people involved.
Education of Looked After Children
5.6 Setting targets and
monitoring performance
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5.6 Targeted funding to
improve education of
looked after children
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5.6 Guidance on good
practice
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5.6 The Government is committed to improving the educational outcomes of children looked after, and as Chapter 2 makes clear, one of the key targets for improved outcomes for looked after children is in relation to their educational attainment. The Department for Education and Employment, the Department of Health and the Welsh Office are collaborating closely to promote significant improvement in the education and attainment of looked after young people. The following action is being taken forward:
- piloting new data collection systems in 10 local authorities in 1998/9 and reviewing the outcomes in early 1999. In addition to providing important technical information, this will provide an opportunity to consider some hard data and permit the Government to review the current target, with the intention of setting more ambitious ones
- using Educational Development Plans in England and Education Strategic Plans in Wales as a means of both setting more challenging local targets and improving the monitoring of local performance
- using Education Action Zones in England to focus on the education of looked after children. Guidance for the next round of applications will invite innovative proposals to improve the co-ordination and provision of services
- requiring Behaviour Support Plans, which authorities are publishing by the end of the year, to refer specifically to groups - like looked after children - who are particularly at risk of failing to fulfil their potential in education
- issue new guidance on school exclusion and pupil support, stressing the importance of bringing together all the relevant parties where a looked after child is at risk from exclusion, behaviour management, and reintegration after education outside school
- new provision within the Standards Fund in England to help prevent exclusion, and for special educational needs, are to be used in 1999/2000 to support LEA initiatives to improve the education of looked after children. Welsh spending plans will be announced later in the year in line with the Welsh Office annual spending review cycle
- working to help schools develop more effective strategies for dealing with EBD, which often develop as a result of family difficulties, including developing and disseminating knowledge on effective practice with EBD children, particularly early identification of difficulties, and effective intervention before these get worse
- developing new guidance on the education of looked after children highlighting key features of emerging good practice and reinforcing messages of good collaboration, for issuing for consultation in Summer 1999. This will become statutory for both education and social services
- preparing steps to secure the best possible links between schools (and secure units) over special educational needs and in due course backing this up in a revision of the Code of Practice on the Identification and Assessment of Special Educational Needs
- encouraging more schools to offer places to looked after young people by improving the content of the performance tables so that they provide more contextual information on pupils who have special educational needs and through the new GCSE/GNVQ average point score so as to reflect the achievements of a wide range of pupils.
5.7 The Government will also consider:
- using the entry into care as a key opportunity to assess an individual child's educational needs and to develop a plan to deliver these
- new measures to encourage carers and social workers to take an interest in and promote the educational achievement of the children in their care.
Implementation, monitoring and enforcement
5.8 The Government is taking forward the following action in relation to education:
- outlawing corporal punishment for all pupils in independent schools from September 1999
- using legislation, training programmes and guidance to get all boarding schools to have the welfare standards of the best
- improving the overall quality of teachers, with the setting up of the General Teaching Councils for England and Wales
- introducing new arrangements for inclusion on the Ministry of Defence's Admissible Schools List for parents claiming the Boarding Schools Allowance
- encouraging the inclusion of information on welfare safeguards in brochures from independent schools and ISIS
- making a number of regulatory changes, see Chapter 3
- consulting on the proposal to require approved independent schools to have governing bodies
- taking a range of action for improving the educational attainment of looked after children including setting and monitoring targets for 2001 and 2003
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5.9 The DfEE will work with the Department of Health and the National Assembly in Wales to monitor the success of these changes in terms of the desired outcomes. Monitoring will be made possible by the introduction of new data collections from local authorities, the outcomes of Section 87 inspections, and inspections by SSI and OFSTED and SSIW and OHMCI in Wales (working both independently and jointly). It is also hoped that the planned new joint reviews involving OFSTED, SSI and the Audit Commission will consider these issues.
Outcomes
5.10 The Government expects these policies to result in:
- improved welfare arrangements and protection for children attending schools with boarding provision
- increased numbers of children who become looked after will be kept engaged with education and learning
- improved educational achievement and life chances for children looked after, closing the gap between their outcomes and those of children generally
- better collaboration between LEAs and SSDs in the interests of the education of looked after children.
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