Perth and Kinross has one of the highest levels of presumption of mainstreaming in Scotland. Of the 18.000 pupils in education only 60 who have the most severe and complex needs are placed within its one new sector-leading special school. All other pupils are placed in mainstream schools with the result that all education staff and their partners in social work, health, colleges, Skills Development Scotland and voluntary agencies, require to be skilled in meeting a very wide range of additional support needs which include autism, dyslexia, social and emotional difficulties and so on.
Excellent collaboration between the authors and the Authority’s print and design department led to the creation of an online flipbook with over 100 hyperlinks and 14 Sections which address the issues which were raised during the Authority evaluation. The architecture of the Manual has been highly praised and there is no doubt that a key strength lies in its accessibility and readability.
The impact on children and young people with additional support needs is sometimes hard to judge. However, there is no doubt that improved practice leads to increased motivation resulting in improved attendance, particularly for children and young people with social and emotional needs. It also leads to a reduction in exclusions which in turn broadens and increases achievement, including for looked after children. Within Perth and Kinross, these indicators are all on an upward trend.
PLANNING / · a clear rationale, defined processes and focus on stakeholder needs· contributes to organisation’s goals and addresses current or emerging challenges
Perth and Kinross has one of the highest levels of presumption of mainstreaming in Scotland. Of the 18.000 pupils in education only 60 who have the most severe and complex needs are placed within its one new sector-leading special school. All other pupils are placed in mainstream schools with the result that all education staff and their partners in social work, health, colleges, Skills Development Scotland and voluntary agencies, require to be skilled in meeting a very wide range of additional support needs which include autism, dyslexia, social and emotional difficulties and so on. In addition,national initiatives which include more robust legislation and an increased need for partnership working, higher expectations of parents and a drive for greater achievement for all children and young people, particularly the most vulnerable, challenges all professionals in the field.
An Additional Support Needs (ASN) Review undertaken in 2009 identified the need for practical guidance for all practitioners and managers in education, health and social work to deliver an integrated service which effectively met theneeds of all children and young people with additional support needs. In effect, the evaluation had also identified a gap in national support resources in Scotland and the United Kingdom of an easy-to-access collation of practical guidance on how to meet the additional support needs/special educational needs of children and young people. This resulted in the development of a practical online toolkit, known as The Support Manual, which guides managers and practitioners across all disciplines to deliver best practice.
This ASN evaluation identified best practice. Importantly it also highlighted gaps and areas for development. The 14 Sections of the Manual describe the best practice and address the areas for development through providing:
clarity abut roles and responsibilities
practical advice on identification and assessment
ideas for the design of the curriculum to meet the range of learning and emotional needs
strategies and resources for supporting children and young people with a range of additional support needs
advice about the importance of listening to children and young people as well as developing positive partnerships with parents, social workers, health professionals, college and voluntary agency staff
guidance for leading and managing additional needs provision
prompts for reflection to help practitioners and managers evaluate their practice
Whilst the focus is on practical advice there is also a concise summary of important legislative and philosophical matters. The Manual addresses local and national goals and initiatives through promoting the Council’s priority of supporting vulnerable young people and their families in line with the SOA. It supports the effective implementation of practice in light of recent ASL legislation and the Equality Act (2010) and describes meaningful partnership working in line with GIRFEC as the means to meeting additional support needs. It demonstrates effective use of Curriculum for Excellence to ensure entitlement for all and supports schools and their partners to satisfactorily meet Inspection and Regulation demands through robust evaluation.
Key financial drivers in the development of the Manual included the need to provide:
best value from partnership working with partners mentioned previously;
and, in light of diminishing budgets for external training
excellent materials for (joint) continuous professional development; and
improved practice to ensure good outcomes for children and young people as well as preventing poor practice potentially leading to expensive Tribunals.
DELIVERING / · implemented in all relevant areas and across all the required stakeholders· carried out in a structured and logical way , using robust and sustainable methods
The initial challenge in developing the Manual lay in finding a format which allowed the vast amount of complex information to be presented in a way which made sense to practitioners and which could be read quickly and easily at different levels by newly qualified staff, by experienced staff and by those on the periphery of additional support needs.
Excellent collaboration between the authors and the Authority’s print and design department led to the creation of an online flipbook with over 100 hyperlinks and 14 Sections which address the issues which were raised during the Authority evaluation. The architecture of the Manual has been highly praised and there is no doubt that a key strength lies in its accessibility and readability.
The content of the Manual was developed through continuous collaboration between the authors and practitioners from all services at all levels. This included a Parent Advocacy group. The final draft version underwent scrutiny by over 30 managers and practitioners across all agencies during a cooperative learning day and resulted in helpful feedback for finalising the Manual. It was at this stage that Perth and Kinross realised their creation was pretty special. Having had positive feedback from Scottish Government, Learning and Teaching Scotland and HMIe, it seemed sensible to showcase it to other Authorities. An initial workshop in January 2011 and others in April and June have led to ten Authorities purchasing it with a view to using it as their key resource for meeting additional support needs. Another five Authorities and two (teacher education) universities have expressed interest.
A further attraction for the purchasing Authorities is that because of the online nature of the Manual, it can be customised to utterly reflect each Authority’s own procedures and policies and practice through the addition of ‘local’ hyperlinks. Some Authorities are using the customisation of the Manual as a staff development exercise per se whereby they are working with groups of staff to ensure the text and nomenclature match their own aspirations to promote best practice. Some Authorities intend to use the entire academic session to customise the Manual since they see this exercise as important and valuable. All changes are scrutinised by the author to ensure consistency of language and format and these are subsequently passed to print and design for finalisation. The customised Manual is provided on a link to the purchasing Authority who can choose to display it on their Intranet and/or GLOW. In addition, Perth and Kinross have undertaken to update the Manual annually for five years to ensure all significant relevant national developments are included.
INNOVATION + LEADING PRACTICE / ·Demonstrates leading practice, and is capable of replication elsewhere·Achieves genuine innovation or new ways of working
The Authority believes that the Manual is unique. Whilst the content is invaluable, it is the design concept which has greatly appealed to all who have viewed it. The ability to deliver effective provision for children and young people with additional support needs requires managers and practitioners to have much knowledge and many skills which extend to potentially every aspect of education, social care, health and transition and has to respond to the needs of children and young people who have barriers to learning as a result of disability, family circumstances, including being looked after, social emotional factors and health needs. The means to gathering together this vast quantity of material in a readable, accessible format was the real task. Having agreed on an overall design concept, cutting edge technology, requiring the purchase of new software resulted in the flipbook format with hyperlinks and allows the reader complete flexibility and ease of access, from section to section and within sections to the widest range of information. The use of audio quotations at the start of each section injects a sense of humanity and fun. In reality the development of the Manual challenged the print and design department who will use this learning for future developments.
Whilst Scottish Government and Authorities have developed procedures and legislative advice in response to the ASL Acts and GIREFEC, there is no collated guidance for managers and practitioners which describes in detail how they should work (together) operationally to meet the additional support needs of children and young people. For many Authorities the challenge of mainstreaming and inclusive thinking is a significant issue. Given current financial constraints and the cost of external training, this online toolkit can increasingly play an important role in probationer training and in continuous professional development and has the potential be further developed to provide accredited training. It also fulfils the essential function of being a quick reference and guide for potentially all professionals. Its online format means it has the ability to be textually updated and have hyperlinks added. Its design means that its content can remain current.
Future plans include selling the Support Manual to other Authorities and also to individual schools as a result of many enquires from practitioners following a brief article in TES; this process commenced at the Scottish Learning Festival. It is believed that the Manual can be ‘translated’ for use in England, particularly in light of the recent Green Paper: ‘Support and aspiration: A new approach to special educational needs and disability’. The Authority also has strong links with Professor Loretta Giorcelli who may be interested in franchising the Manual for Australia. Having developed this successful design concept, the Authority has now completed a second Manual using this successful formula to describe the development of the curriculum and pedagogy for children and young people with significant and complex needs in line with Curriculum for Excellence. Already there is interest from other Authorities.
RESULTS + IMPACT / · a convincing mix of customer and internal performance measures· clear line of sight to the delivery of better outcomes for communities
· a full range of relevant results– either already achieved or with potential to deliverover time
It is the belief of Perth and Kinross Council that the Manual will support ‘the aspiration to exceed our comparator authorities by 2011.’ (BMIP Plan 2009-2012). The Authority also believes it can help to respond to the statement in the 2009 HMIE report, Improving Scottish education which states: ‘Whilst there are real strengths in achievement for children and young people in Scotland, we still need to ensure that education is sufficiently inclusive’.
Whilst the Manual is not the sole contributing factor to good and improving practice within Perth and Kinross, the positive Validated Self Evaluation by HMIE made reference to the evaluation which preceded the Manual. The recent very positive Child Protection inspection also commented on the probable impact of the Manual in terms of promoting partnership working. It is also important to note that Perth and Kinross’s sound track record in meeting the needs of their children and also the expectations of the parents of children and young people with additional support needs has certainly prevented attendance at Tribunals. The enthusiasm with which purchasing Authorities have engaged with the Manual has proved it has lots to offer. The roll out has essentially just begun because part of the impact on updating the knowledge and skills of staff will be delivered during the customisation process. Undertaking customisation across disciplines will certainly enhance joint understanding of roles and responsibilities and increase professional respect from one agency to another. The aspirational nature of the Manual which is based on existing best practice will push boundaries and at a minimum promote discussion.
Improved learning environments and earlier interventions through better identification and assessment can ensure that children and young people are safe, happy, active and achieving at their appropriate level. Schools and their partners who know how to work well together can ensure they nurture and include all their children to become responsible, earn respect and be respectful. The Manual demonstrates how to make this happen so that practitioners and managers across all disciplines can make a positive difference to Scotland’s children and young people. Individual schools within the Authority have praised the Manual as a highly effective tool for pre-Inspection preparation. One headteacher commented: ‘I felt prepared for the inspection and was confident in debating our evaluation for meeting needs’. Another said: ‘The Section which helped us update our policy on meeting needs was extremely useful and ensured we were clear about aspects of our practice’. One speech and language therapist has said that her schools better understand the need to have a named person for her to speak with on a regular basis. Schools and their partners are also regularly using the Successful Support Stories to explore new resources and strategies. One practitioner outwith Perth and Kinross has commented: ‘I wish I had seen this successful support story earlier. It would have helped my school and the child’s parents to deal more effectively with the issues.’ Some schools have printed off the Manual’s ‘Prompts for Reflection’ as a quick and easy guide for on-going self evaluation and on-going professional development.
The impact on children and young people with additional support needs is sometimes hard to judge. However, there is no doubt that improved practice leads to increased motivation resulting in improved attendance, particularly for children and young people with social and emotional needs. It also leads to a reduction in exclusions which in turn broadens and increases achievement, including for looked after children. Within Perth and Kinross, these indicators are all on an upward trend.
COSLA EXCELLENCE AWARDS 2012 Page | 1
COSLA EXCELLENCE AWARDS 2012 Page | 1