1. Children in Care Conference
Aspire to Achieve for
Children in Care Conference
Essex LA 19 January 2016
Andrew Cook - Regional Director, East of England
Ofsted has changed markedly in the twenty years since it was founded and it will continue to evolve to meet the demands of an evolving education system.
We have seen tremendous improvements in the education system over that time. Replacing the grade of ‘satisfactory’ with ‘requires improvement’, as we did in 2012, sent a clear message that only ‘good’ is good enough.
Our recent consultation on education inspection marked the beginning of Ofsted’s next chapter. Thank you to those of you here who took the time and effort to give us your views.
We’re making far-reaching changes to inspection methods and the inspection workforce to drive even greater consistency and quality in our inspections – and ultimately increase standards in education across the country. 
Today, I’m going to discuss with you the reforms that we’re going to introduce from September 2015.
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3. The school inspectorate Ofsted has put an increasing emphasis on how well children from disadvantaged background do at school, with looked after children under particular scrutiny.
Last year, only 8pc of children in care in Norfolk gained at least five GCSEs at A*-C, including English and maths. The figures for 2015 show this has risen to 26pc - 10 percentage points above the national average.
There was also a significant increase in the proportion of children in care making the expected progress in English and maths, with both figures above the national average.

4. Essex
2015 KS2 outcomes for children in care: These improved substantially in reading = 75% (up from 60% in 2014), writing = 65% (up from 56% in 2014) and mathematics = 67% (up from 54% in 2014). The proportion of LAC who achieved at least a Level 4 in all three was 53% KS4 outcomes for children in care: The proportion of children in care who achieved at least five good GCSE’s including English and mathematics rose from 8.5% last year to 19.4% this year (provision data). This shows substantial improvement on last year’s results but remains some distance from the national rate for all pupils.

5. Issues
Educational outcomes for children in care are well below that of their peers and are particularly poor at Key Stage 4.
Children in care are over-represented in PRUs.
Exclusions and attendance data for children in care highlights concerns.
Care leavers over-represented in NEET figures.
Limited information on progress at Key Stage 5.
Few care leavers go to university.

6. There is evidence that children’s educational achievement improves the longer they are in care.

7. Ofsted SIF inspection
Corporate parenting lacks rigour and ambition. Leaders are not sufficiently proactive in enabling looked after children to shape services and influence their decisions. Although looked after children attend good schools, their achievements are not consistently strong. The virtual school lacks sufficient capacity to monitor and improve education outcomes for looked after children, including those in post-16 education. Personal education plans lack effective targets and use of the pupil premium is not well monitored. Initial health assessments are not completed promptly and there is insufficient focus on children’s mental health and wellbeing.
Peterborough City Council Inspection of services for children in need of help and protection, children looked after and care leavers: 13 April 2015 – 8 May 2015

8. Educational achievement
What is more important?
Social/health needs
Educational achievement or

9. What impacts on achievement?
Children in care
School grade?
Home moves?
School moves?
Attendance?
Mental health?
SEND?

10. Improving outcomes: musts
Every child in care is unique.
Each child in care has unique individual needs which are constantly changing.
Communication and effective partnership working between all agencies is crucial.

11. Improving outcomes: musts
A clear message at a strategic level (LA).
Attendance at a good or better school for children in care.
Partnerships with designated teachers.
A virtual school that supports and challenges school leaders – joint accountability.

12. The school inspection handbook
how effectively leaders monitor the progress of groups of pupils to ensure that none falls behind and underachieve, and how effectively governors hold them to account for this (p38)
how well leaders and governors engage with parents, carers and other stakeholders and agencies to support all pupils (p39)

13. A school culture that promotes achievement for children in care
School leaders monitor the progress of children in care
Governor’s hold school leaders to account
The school engages with parents and carers
A school culture that promotes achievement for children in care

14. The school inspection handbook
Quality of teaching, learning and assessment
teachers and other staff have consistently high expectations of what each pupil can achieve, including most able and disadvantaged pupils (p44)
assessment information is gathered from looking at what pupils already know, understand and can do, and is informed by their parents/previous providers as appropriate in the early years (p45)

15. PEPS Short term targets Pupil engagement Regularly evaluated
PEPS – high expectations
Short term targets
Pupil engagement
Regularly evaluated
Evidence PP funding use
Tackle all barriers

16. Ofsted SIF inspection
The head of the virtual school provides extensive training and support to designated teachers and head teachers to support them in their work with children looked after. She monitors and tracks the educational achievement and progress of children looked after at all stages thoroughly.
The virtual school has accurate data, and effective tracking mechanisms for the numbers of children looked after in alternative and part-time education and those who are missing school. Staff work diligently to place children looked after in appropriate and good settings, and take swift and appropriate action to ensure that this happens.
Hertfordshire County Council Inspection of services for children in need of help and protection, children looked after and care leavers : 14 September 2015 – 8 October 2015

17. Other challenges Early Years
Post-16 – partnership with the care leaving services
Children in care placed out of area and those from other LAs placed in area
Points to make:
Partnership between the virtual school and pre-school age providers appear to be underdeveloped (or is it that we do not have sufficient evidence to report clearly on pre-age 5 levels of development?)
This is a great shame. We know that the earlier the support the more chance we have to influence children’s levels of development.
Some LAs are starting to develop pre-school PEPs and high –quality learning journals. We are checking the quality of these through children’s centres inspections. Some LAs make sure that all children on a plan (CP, CIN or LAC ) are registered at their local CC. This provides a vehicle for foster carers to get support in EYFS and early learning/readiness for schools. When we ask CC ‘How many foster carers live in your area’ – they often don’t know. Do they in your LA?
Partnership and the influence of the VS Post 16 is improving slowly, linked to the raising of participation age. Not all VS know the destination of 16 year olds LAC at the end of Year 11. Pathway planning and transition: Much more needs to be done to ensure that care leavers are supported to achieve. Currently planning for transition is weak (see curriculum and outcomes issue). Joint planning with the care leaving teams is not embedded.
Partnerships with other virtual schools – Regional groups of headteachers of VS are welcomed developments. Schools report difficulties when dealing with pupils from different LAs, e.g. different formats for PEPs, different allocation of pupil premium funding, inconsistencies in role and availability of the social workers.
The training of foster carers is done but limited evidence of monitoring what happens next e.g. foster carers engagement with schools. E.g. do you know whether foster carers attend parents evenings? Do you know whether schools provide additional help and do you provide additional help to foster carers and adoptive families?

18. What is Ofsted’s role?

19. Ofsted’s expectations
Children receive the same support from their carers as they would from a good parent.
All looked after children attend good schools where they make good progress.
Pupils make good progress from their different starting points – focus on the most vulnerable.
Pupils in alternative provision access 25 hours per week of good-quality education.
High quality education and training opportunities are available for all Post 16 students.
Staff in children’s homes positively address challenges and barriers to educational progress and achievement.
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20. Ofsted’s role Inspection. Challenging and holding LA’s to account.
Inspecting Virtual schools?
Improvement work.
Engaging with a range of stake holders e.g. DfE.
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21. East of England Priorities 2016/17
Secure high quality inspection and regulation.
Improving outcomes for disadvantaged children and learners.
Focusing on the basics: literacy and numeracy outcomes.
Improving the proportion of good and better providers.
East of England Priorities 2016/17

22. 2016/17 2. Improving outcomes for disadvantaged children and learners:
Our focus on LAC and FSM eligible pupils must now extend to thinking about Children in Need (CiN) and the growing number of vulnerable unaccompanied young adults that are entering the region.

24. What we learnt from
The quality of the relationship children and young people in care establish with an adult in school is critical to their success.
The quality of the friendships they make with other children are very important.
They do not always feel that they have any control over the decisions made about their future.
They have a lot of ‘plans’ written about them which they do not understand.
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25. https://twitter.com/AndrewCookHMI
Closing remarks –
Thank you for engaging with us