Using NAPLAN to track educational attainment for children in out of home care.

New testing could allow agencies to monitor educational outcomes of most disadvantaged group NAPLAN testing began in 2008 ▫Literacy and numeracy- Year levels- 3,5,7,9 ▫Educational needs assessment based on NAPLAN OCG requirement BUT How can we get the information? What will it tell us about individuals? What will it tell us about the program? How should we be routinely collecting this?

Experimental Study set out to explore one programs work : How are children in Find a Family NSW program doing in terms of educational attainment? Are particular children doing better or worse? Are the current practices of spending on remedial education adequate?

Getting started- what information was available Few results on casework records- Department of Education routinely supplies results to carers but few results getting to agency files ▫- only 50% on files Difficulties in get results from DET  No automatic info from DET- negotiations begun  No centralised information from Catholic and Independent schools  No capacity to routinely get scores- only bands  No information for entry to school tests.  No access to DET educational reports, SMART, HSC, ROSA

Study undertaken in Find a Family Children only after final orders: babies to 18 years High level of behavioural disturbance (Care+1 and 2) Intake placements used until permanent carers found One half of children ultimately adopted

Study Group

Method of the study DET gave special access to scaled scores for some children in FAF- testing since 2008 Identified minimum and average standards Compared individual’s scores and characteristics of the child ▫Averaged literacy components- reading, writing, spelling, grammar- and collected numeracy ▫Analysed individual literacy components Looked at FAF children as a group Look at children over time

Our study participants: FaF children targeted with birthdays between (NAPLAN age): 116 (initially we only held records for a few) Children analysed with scaled scores provided by DET: 57 (eg. 23 did Year 3 tests, 22 year 5, 15 year 7, 18 year 9= 78 tests) Children analysed using casework records in addition: 30 (1/4 of FAF-25 from first batch supplemented with 5 from second DET batch) Children who have sat multiple NAPLAN tests 21 Children who have sat multiple NAPLAN tests whilst in Barnardos care 18

Study question 1 How are children in FAF doing educationally?

NumeracyLiteracy

Average age of entry into FAF 7.12 years

LiteracyNumeracy

Reading Comparison over two tests Naplan scores Child

Numeracy comparison over two tests Naplan score Child

Study Question 2 Are particular children doing better or worse?  Children’s behaviour  Children’s experience of placement breakdowns  Children’s length of time in current placement  Children experiencing exclusion and suspension

Example of children in program Into care at 6 mths, now 11 years of age, year 6 Care level is now known placements Current placement 2 years 5 months 3 changes in school incl suspensions, currently in ED placement. Multiple diagnosed disorders incl PTSD, ADHD, ODD & DID. Above NMS for 2 years of NAPLAN Tailored and specific educational interventions

Colour:Meaning: RedBelow National Minimum Standard Amber/YellowBetween National Minimum Standard and National Average Bright GreenAbove National Average Children de-identified: * denotes child with a diagnosed disability I/C denotes child who attends Independent or Catholic school respectively

Case study 1 Came into care at 10 yrs of age, long history abuse and neglect. Low school attendance No diagnosed disabilities 1 placement change – planned intake to permanent 9/10 NAPLAN below NMS Introduce literacy & numeracy tutoring Continues to struggle, enjoys school and is improving “feels secure with everything around her, feels she doesn’t have to worry’

Placement changes and NAPLAN achievement No correlation in our study : ▫Some with less than two placement changes were below minimum ▫One with 18 placement changes was above minimum ▫Limited data showed unplanned changes had impact

Length of time in current placement and NAPLAN achievement No correlation in our study ▫8 years in placement still below minimum ▫Numeracy and literacy showed similar trends

Impact of suspensions and NAPLAN achievement No clear correlation in this study Those with no suspensions were still ‘below minimum’ No ‘above average results’ with high number of suspensions

Study Question 3 Are the current practices of spending on remedial education adequate?

N.B: This only includes the 25 original children included in the study.

Findings of study Most children below average but above minimum- many need help Higher proportion below minimum than whole Australian population Care levels, placement changes, suspensions not clearly associated with scores Need for better data on $ spent for each child

Recommendation on use of NAPLAN Caseworkers ▫ Attention to collecting and analysing NAPLAN scores for individual children from schools/carers ▫Greater awareness of educational reports from NAPLAN Agency challenges: ▫Need to get information sent from Education Departments on scores ▫Need to investigate entry to school testing ▫Need to improve internal recording of educational expenditure Incorporation of NAPLAN into Looking After Children Electronic system (LACES) to become MyStory

Ideal access to educational data Electronic access to NAPLAN scaled scores- : lowest 20% (NMS)and average as key indicators (NAS) Electronic access to old test results to monitor progress From : ▫NSW DET ▫Catholic schools ▫Independent schools Best Start results and how to analyse ? Alignment with NAPLAN HSC results ?SMART

Progress since study Letter sent to all schools requesting data under Chapter 16a– NAPLAN, Best start, IEP’s and Behaviour Plans from ‘prescribed body” with “direct responsibility for, or direct supervision of welfare and residential services’ (May 2012) ▫121 letters sent out – received responses from 17 schools ▫12 public and 5 independent ▫3 behaviour plans – public ▫5 best start – public Negotiation of DET MOU – still outstanding but hopeful Individual letters to Catholic and Independent schools

What agencies should do Annual 16A requests with lists of students with dob, correctly named or coded school, ?SRN Individual letters to Catholic and Independent school, ? To DET with written permissions Lobby for MOU

Cautions NAPLAN less reliable at lower bands- affects our children Need to consider with all child’s information- off days, school based issues School differences- checkout MySchool