City of York YorOK Board

11th January 2016

Virtual School storyboardAppendix B

Introduction

The City of York has a small, fluctuating cohort of school aged Looked After Children (CLA). As a whole cohort they make up York’s Virtual School for and in July 2015 that cohort was 132 5-16 year olds, 70% of whom are educated in York with the remaining 30% in a range of schools across the country.

In 2010/11 the Virtual School head was part time and a member of the School Improvement Service. In 2011/12 the Virtual School head was a deputy headteacher seconded one day a week from a secondary school. In September 2012 Tricia Head (Serving HT) was approached to take up temporary oversight of the Virtual School as there was an interregnum when Sian stepped down from her secondment. Tricia Head agreed to do this on a voluntary basis as she recognised there was a lot of productive overlap with her role as Headteacher of The Danesgate Community.

In September 2013 it became statutory that LA’s should have a Virtual School Headteacher (VSH). At the same time Ofsted changed the LA inspection framework and the role of the Virtual School became clearer in terms of expected impact on overall outcomes as well as the monitoring of progress and the quality of education planning for CLA. By April 2014 there were two other significant developments. One was that the DfE had published a draft set of regulations for the work a VSH should do in a L.A and, two, the Pupil Premium for CLA had gone up to £1900 so there was significant extra resource targeted at raising achievement of CLA. The increase in the pupil premium has been matched with an increase in the scrutiny of its usage and a directive from the DfE that the Virtual Head in each Local Authority should be responsible for the total pupil premium allocation and its allocation to schools.

Current structure of Virtual School

In September 2014 the Local Authority appointed an Assistant Head to the Virtual School and asked the Headteacher of The Danesgate Community to act as Virtual School Head on a temporary basis and train up the AVSH to become the full VSH by early November 2015. This handover of duties is now complete and from 1.11.15 Sarah Clarke became VSH. The model of using an experienced serving headteacher who specialises in vulnerable cohorts has shown a lot of added value for the Virtual School and so Tricia Head will continue to support the Virtual School as a Consultant Headteacher.

The Virtual School also has a part time tutor – Anna Pearson – formerly of the Specialist Team but now lined managed by the VSH. There is a part time Educational Psychologist –Cathy Ardern - and a part time administrator –Susan Large. Gill Clapham is our designated Connexions worker for our looked after young people and works with the most vulnerable in Years 9 -12 for whom mainstream Connexions support is not enough, preparing them for transition and supporting them through all the steps to further education. Alongside Sarah, Anna, Gill and Cathy, other LA colleagues give of their time to be part of the Virtual School senior leadership team – these are: Stephanie Windsor (Early Years Senior Adviser), Maxine Benson (Early Years Consultant), Nikki Wilson (Children’s Rights Advocate); Karron Young (School Improvement Adviser, Primary) and Mike Jory (School Improvement Adviser, Secondary) .

With increased capacity we are able to be more strategic in providing challenge around narrowing the gap as well as engaging in greater operational work supporting children and young people, schools and social care. The AVSH (now VSH) was appointed with a clear remit to strengthen links between the Virtual School, Social care and schools, provide training (on PEPs, Designated Teacher and Developmental Trauma and Attachment), support and challenge in improving outcomes for children and young people in care.

There is much work to be done in all aspects of the Virtual School but we are in a much better place than we were a year ago. We have a working School Self Evaluation and School Improvement Plan and we know what work there is to do and have identified a tight set of operational actions and strategic work-streams in order to improve the virtual school. With the capacity provided by the AVSH and the appointment of an Administrative assistant for four days a week we are already seeing improved outcomes and better support for staff in schools to meet the needs of their looked after children and young people.

Which stakeholder groups do we work with to improve education outcomes for our young people?

The Virtual School works in direct partnership with key L.A bodies:

  • Joint Panel and the Transitions Post Maintained panel (TPUM)
  • Multi Agency Looked After Partnership (MALAP)
  • Local Childrens Safeguarding Board
  • Behaviour & Attendance Partnership
  • Yor-OK BoardYork Headteacher forums
  • Corporate Parenting Board

The Virtual School is part of the Yorkshire & Humber Virtual School Network.

The VSH is on the steering group for PAC-UK to develop ‘attachment friendly’ schools in York and is also involved in a research project with University of Surrey regarding attachment as a barrier to learning.

The Virtual School is co-located with The Danesgate Community. The mission of The Danesgate Community is to raise achievement for York’s vulnerable young people whatever their context or starting point. The Danesgate Community already works in partnership with schools and L.A. agencies and has a good track record of improving outcomes for vulnerable young people with SEMH needs. The Headteacher of The Danesgate Community is an experienced headteacher with mainstream school and specialist setting experience who is able to bring a ‘school improvement model’ approach to the Virtual School. Within this frame of reference the rationale for co-locating York’s Virtual School alongside The Danesgate Community has much to recommend it. We have run this model for one year now and there is evidence of impact in terms of outcomes and in terms of the ability to work efficiently to find solutions to problems regarding provision for York’s CLA who are hard to place or who have additional barriers to learning that are preventing them reaching their potential.

The VSH meets with foster carers and social workers to deliver education up-dates and hear about issues that need attention.

The VSH meets with the Show Me that I Matter panel to hear about issues that need attention.

Local Picture and current needs

  1. Students in the Virtual School

The City of York has a fluctuating cohort of school aged Looked After Children. The Virtual School is made up of the whole cohort of school aged Looked After Children where York is the corporate parent but they may live and be educated anywhere. In July 2015 that cohort was 132 (down from last July’s 169) 5-16 year olds, 70% are educated in York with 30% in a range of schools across the country.

2015/16 (may change) / Primary / Secondary / Total/%
CYC CLA (5-16) / 51 (39%) / 81 (61%) / 132 (100%)
Educated in York
Educated OOA / 31 (61%)
20 (39%) / 61 (75%)
20 (25%) / 92(70%)
40(30%)
Mainstream in York / 28 (55%) / 38 (46%) / 66 (50%)
Mainstream OOA / 18 (35%) / 11 (14%) / 29(22%)
Specialist in York / 3 (5%) / 23 (29%) / 26(20%)
Specialist OOA / 2 (4%) / 9 (11%) / 11(8%)
2014/15 (end of year) / Primary / Secondary / Total/%
CYC CLA (5-16) / 69 (41%) / 100 (59%) / 169 (100%)
Educated in York
Educated OOA / 44 (64%)
25 (36%) / 73 (73%)
27 (27%) / 117 (69%)
52 (31%)
Mainstream in York / 42 (25%) / 42 (25%) / 84 (50%)
Mainstream OOA / 22 (13%) / 18 (11%) / 40 (24%)
Specialist in York / 2 (1%) / 31 (18%) / 33 (19%)
Specialist OOA / 3 (2%) / 9 (5%) / 12 (7%)
  1. What kind of schools are our young people attending?

85% of our young people in care attending a Good or Outstanding school. This is well above national or regional.

9% (7 schools) are judged by Ofsted to be Requiring Improvement Schools – these are largely out of area and we work closely with our VS colleagues in other L.As to avoid placement at an RI school if possible. Sometimes the placement location drives the school location and this cannot always be helped. For the local primary schools which are RI/Inadequate we work closely with Karron Young, the Primary School Improvement Advisor, to ensure that any work she does in the schools has a focus on the progress and attainment of CLA recognising that removing a settled child from school with peers can negatively impact on attainment.

3% of our schools (2 schools, 1 in York and 1 Out of Area) are judged to be inadequate. We keep close case study style monitoring on these schools.

We are constantly monitoring the status of our schools and stress to social workers the need to liaise with the Virtual School before completing a school admissions form. In some L.As the VS has to sign off any school request but this is not the case in York so this is a protocol that needs to be addressed at strategic level in the L.A. The VS has worked hard to support and direct social workers and other L.A. partners with regard to the importance of school choices. The VS work in this area comprises:

  • regular emails and training with social workers and foster carers to raise awareness
  • sharing protocols with social workers regarding finding a school place
  • liaising direct with VSHs in other L.As to get support for appropriate and timely school admissions
  • doing due diligence visits to out of area placements to ensure education quality is driving L.A. placement decisions as much as care needs
  • VSH sits on Joint Panel so can influence out of area placements
  • VSH has been put on distribution list for ‘change of placement forms’
  1. How are our young people doing at school?
  1. Education Outcomes

Please note – due to the size of the cohorts year on year the ability to tease out trends in education outcomes and associated work streams is not straightforward but we do use retrospective outcome data, progress tracking and future ambitions to drive our Virtual School Improvement plan.

There is still much to do to improve our data collection. We are considerably more secure in this than we were 3 years ago and have a very useful VS data calendar cycle now. However the key development in this area is that the VS is constructing a school Integris database which will work more like a mainstream school and so be able to report on our cohort better than the L.A. wide systems do at present.

EYFS – evidence of improvement positive but very small dataset

2015 – 100% of CLA (3 pupils) recorded a Good Level of Development, better than All York (70%) and National (63%)

2014 – 100% of CLA (2 pupils) recorded a Good Level of Development, All York (?) and National (?)

2013 – 0% of CLA (9) pupils recorded a GLD, All York (56%), National (n/a)

End KS1 – evidence of improvement positive but not contextualised at present

2011/12 / 2012/13 / 2013/14 / 2014/15 / Impact/issues
L2+ Reading, Writing
York CLA / 46% / 37.5% / 50% / n/a /
  • Underneath these figures the performance of CLA in York schools is consistently higher for each year shown
  • Need more information on gaps

L2+ York
L2+ Maths
York CLA / 46% / 37.5% / 62.5% / n/a
L2+ York
Gap York
L2+ CLA National
L2+ National
Gap National

End KS2 – evidence of significant improvement but trend not established at present so keeping this closely under review

2011/12 / 2012/13 / 2013/14 / 2014/15 / Impact/issues
L4+ English & Maths CLA National / 42% / 45% / 48% / n/a /
  • Hard to compare over years as testing methodology has changed.
  • Gap has narrowed more in York compared to national
  • VS had done focused interventions for Reading and Writing over 14/15 in response to outcomes in 13/14 and impact is clear with x % increase (see RW separated data sheet)
  • Maths is the focus area for 15/16 – Maths at KS2 is the pull back score

L4+ English & Maths Non CLA National / 75% / 76% / 79% / n/a
Gap - national / 33% / 31% / 31% / n/a
L4+ English & Maths CLA York / 56% / 40% / 33% / 73%
L4+ English & Maths Non CLA York / 86% / 84% / 69% / 68%
Gap - York / 30% / 44% / 36% / -5%

End KS4 - attainment predominantly considerably higher than national, gap had been narrowing more quickly than national but now opened again so clearly gains in terms of attainment not yet secure. L1 thresholds continuing to improve and, as a consequence, post 16 progression much more secure which is a significant positive.

2011/12 / 2012/13 / 2013/14
Old / 2013/14
new / 2014/15 / Impact/issues
5+A-C IEM
CLA National / 15% / 16% / 14% / 12% / n/a /
  • York schools had been making good progress in narrowing the gap up to new qualifications and methodology.
  • The L2 threshold gap is now greater than it was but trend analysis is hard due to methodology change.
  • Deeper analysis of other KS4 thresholds (see CPB report extract below) shows that we are making good progress with 5+A-G IEM and this is helping with post 16 progression to L2 programmes
  • 1+ qual also of great importance to us as it signals fact we have been able to sustain education relationship even with hardest to reach CLA.
  • Gap still too wide – school development plan has PP+ research project in hand with Huntington school to see where we are making most impact and share good practice
  • Issues for KS4 are compounded by placement stability and length of time in care ( a lot of late entrants to care have been out of parental control for some time and education gap already an issue)

5+A-C IEM
Non CLA National / 59% / 59% / 55% / 52% / n/a
Gap - national / 44% / 43% / 41% / 40% / n/a
5+A-C IEM
CLA York / 13% / 38% / 25% / 20% / 17%
5+A-C IEM
Non CLA York / 63% / 67% / n/a / 66% / 64%
Gap - York / 50% / 25% / n/a / 46% / 47%

2015 KS4 results with other thresholds showing

Total / 5+A-Ciem / 5+A-C / 5+A-Giem / 5+A-G / 1A*-C / 1+A-G
18
(20) / 3
(5) / 3
(6) / 11
(12) / 11
(12) / 9 / 17
(18)
17%
(20%) / 17%
(30%) / 61%
(60%) / 61%
(60%) / 50% / 94%
(95%)

What is attendance like?

Our current academic year attendance figures show:

Years R, 1 and 2 - No recorded absences

Year 3 average attendance 98.44%

Year 4 100% attendance.

Year 5 Average attendance 99.08%.

Year 6 Average attendance: 99.49%.

Year 7 average attendance: 97.63%.

Year 8 average: 97.43%.

Year 9 average attendance: average 97.26%

Year 10 average 96.32%

Year 11 average 96.37%

This tells us that we are meeting government requirements for 95% attendance or above in general although there will always be individual students whose attendance is cause for concern and we will, alongside their mainstream school, monitor their attendance and how this impacts on their progress and achievement and aim to support improved attendance wherever possible.

Do they get excluded?

We have had no permanent exclusions of a young person in care for many years now but we do have young people in care getting fixed term exclusions. The VSH has worked hard with Headteachers and Pastoral Leads in school to emphasise the impact of a fixed term exclusion and the DfE guidance that education must be put in place after day one even if the fixed term exclusion is for a longer period than this. Sometimes, however, despite everyone’s efforts the behaviour of a young person can be so anti social that the Headteacher of a school has to use the full range of sanctions at their disposal including the use of fixed term exclusions. York schools know that provision must be picked up after day one and that Danesgate is always available to support this provision.

The data collection in this area has up to this year not been easily available. CLA exclusion data was not routinely gathered and reported on at LA level. However, for 15/16 the LA have put in systems that ensure that any exclusion information is reviewed with the Virtual School Head at the end of each half term. The increased accuracy of the VS database also helps make the reporting and response systems more efficient.

The data will be more detailed as each half term passes but the retrospective data that we do have shows that over the past 2 years the rate of fixed term exclusions has improved at a better rate than national. The CLA gap still needs to narrow however and with more accurate information from Sept 15/16 we anticipate an improvement in this area.

2010/11 / 2011/12 / 2012/13 / 2013/14
Percentage of children permanently excluded / Percentage of children with at least one fixed exclusion / Percentage of children permanently excluded / Percentage of children with at least one fixed exclusion / Percentage of children permanently excluded / Percentage of children with at least one fixed exclusion / Percentage of children permanently excluded / Percentage of children with at least one fixed exclusion
Permanent and Fixed Term Exclusions
York CLA / 0.00 / 11.88 / x / 6.90 / 0.00 / 14.66 / 0.00 / 9.09
ENGLAND CLA / 0.27 / 12.62 / 0.24 / 11.79 / 0.15 / 11.33 / 0.11 / 9.78
York All Pupils / x / 2.91 / 0.02 / 2.80 / x / 2.76 / x / 2.41
ENGLAND All Pupils / 0.07 / 4.34 / 0.07 / 4.05 / 0.06 / 3.52 / 0.06 / 3.50

Where do our young people go after end of Y11?

The LA has not up to this year had a system of routinely collecting this information so trend analysis not possible. It is very pleasing to the Virtual School, however, that a reporting system has been developed now and we have the figures for 14/15 and these are very positive. The impact of the VS commissioning a Connexions worker is clear in the following statistics:

55% went to FE College in September 2015

12% went to a mainstream school 6th form in September 2015

17% stayed at a special school 6th form in September 2015

5.5% went onto an Apprenticeship

5% re-sat Y11 due to health issues

5.5% (1 student) is currently NEET

The Personal Education Plan (PEP)

A PEP is a document which summarises educational provision for a CLA and, crucially, highlights targets for the year and additional support needed. Improving the quality and completion of PEPs was an Ofsted action point from May 2012 inspection. The PEP completion rate as at the end of 14/15 was 93% a significant increase over the past 2 years.

Sarah Clarke (AVSH) re-wrote the PEP document last year in line with the My Support Plan (MSP) and Education, Health, Care Plan (EHCP to meet the new Special Educational Needs and Disability (SEND) code of practice.

Sarah Clarke worked with the Show Me That I Matter Group and The Children’s Trust to develop a child and young person centred explanation of PEPs. By working with Show Me That I Matter we were able to get user involvement on the wording and lay-out of the document to ensure it met their needs.

We feel we can improve the PEP still further so it remains a critical part of our Virtual School Improvement Plan.

Sarah Clarke quality assures the PEPs and tracks academic progress information so that there is a growing link between the PEP targets and impact on outcomes.

Use of Pupil Premium for Looked After Children and Young People

The rules for pupil premium for CLA have changed since 1.4.14. The conditions of grant are very clear and it is the role of the VSH to allocate pupil premium and monitor its effectiveness. The VSH put a paper out to all schools following the publication of the DfE’s paper – Role of the Virtual School Head – and as a results head teachers, after consultation, agreed that York should top slice a small amount of the PP+ and keep this in a central pot. This resource provides: