Annex B
12 October 2006
EVERY CHILD MATTERS AND SCHOOL STANDARDS
Dear Colleague
You will have seen the letter which Alan Johnson
wrote to Council Leaders last week setting out developments and
priorities for Every Child Matters and school standards.
We wanted to follow that letter up and share our own thoughts
about the way we should work together in this next important period
of change.
You may be aware of the work that we undertook
over the summer looking at how well we are making the links between
school standards and Every Child Matters. This was an important
piece of work designed to answer two questions. The first was
how far have the actions that the Government set out in the original
Every Child Matters Green Paper three years ago been delivered.
The second question was how effectively are we implementing ECM
alongside the drive on school standards.
The answers to the first question are encouraging.
ECM set out a long-term reform and there is still a substantial
programme to manage closely together. But we have delivered many
of the commitments already and we are on track to deliver the
vast majority of the remaining commitments in this Parliament.
Some of these commitments are high profile and will have an increasing
impact in communities up and down the country over the next year—for
example as we roll out Sure Start Children's Centres, with over
1,000 already in place and with more than one a day opening over
the next two years.
It is too early to find hard research evidence
on outcomes of these changes but we are beginning to see qualitative
evidence from those local authorities which have been early adopters,
of an improvement in customer service to children and parents
where you have joined up the different professionals who are there
to support children. There are case studies which show this better
service leading through to some of the changes we all want to
see such as improved behaviour, better school attendance and reductions
in referrals to the child protection register.
The second question—how well aligned are
ECM and standards—led to an analysis of whether schools
are being distracted from the drive on standards. There is clear
evidence that there is no distraction amongst schools that have
been early adopters of extended schools—they have continued
to drive up standards as fast as anyone at the very time they
have been going through the set up stage in their own school.
And this finding is backed up by Ofsted's analysis of their first
term's inspections on the new inspection framework.
But there are some risks as we move forward
which we must manage closely. The first is that it is clear from
the fieldwork that we have delivery chains that are not adequately
aligned—some talk about standards, some about ECM and there
is not enough connection. This inevitably means that messages
are not joined up as they should be and there is not yet enough
focus on the contribution that ECM can make to standards and vice
versa.
We are quite clear that the message for the
next phase of reform is simple. It is "no school standards
without Every Child Matters and no ECM without school standards".
To underpin this, we will:
— Increase the focus on helping schools
not just to improve classroom teaching and learning, but also
to create "personalised strategies" for children who
are not yet achieving expected standards. Schools should focus
more on the needs of the bottom quartile of children at KS2 and
KS3—those who are not achieving the standards we want. To
make this work, we need to embed a data driven approach in schools
and this should increasingly drive both the ECM and standards
work at school level.
— Clarify for schools what is expected
of them in "delivering standards and ECM". We are at
the threshold of a major drive on extended schools, as we move
from a successful roll out among early adopters with around 10%
of schools covered towards the target for all schools to have
an extended offer by 2010. The approach in this roll out phase
must be consistent with schools as self-governing units with their
own clear accountabilities, but it must also, chart a path to
better access to services in the local community. The core message
for schools is that they must provide a safe environment for all
their children and should then focus on achievement. But they
also have a wider role to play in contributing to other outcomes
for children. The wider role will vary according to local circumstances
and the needs of their pupils.
— Vigorously pursue the outcomes from
ECM and clarify the importance of continuing to press on standards
while integrating and expanding children's services. We need to
step up a gear on PSA targets and see a systematic return on the
reform programme in terms of better standards and outcomes. The
Government Offices have a key role to play here, and we are looking
for the forthcoming Priorities Meetings with you to cement a shared
understanding of national and local priorities and the central
support you can expect in driving change, with a clear link to
robust targets and clear action in your Children and Young People's
Plans. The Education Bill also sets out clear responsibilities—and
new powers—for local authorities to intervene quickly where
standards are not good enough. We expect you to use these new
powers to develop choice and diversity in the system, within the
context of your plans for ECM.
— Establish a strong performance focus
which quickly identifies emerging and effective practice as well
as any delivery issues/problems in ECM and standards. We need
in particular to make sure there is a real focus on standards
in all parts of the delivery system and make sure that our delivery
chains are aligned. We want in this next phase to develop arrangements
to share best practice and increasingly help local authorities
to learn from each other, as well as from expert consultants in
the field forces. The field forces are increasingly being managed
or coordinated through Government Offices, to ensure that their
messages are fully joined up, synergies exploited and there is
a sensible orchestration of their activities to reflect the priorities
agreed at the autumn priorities meetings. We also have a review
of all our field forces under way, due to report around the end
of this calendar year and we will involve you in the emerging
thinking and share the conclusions with you.
— Improve the connection of local and
national partners to the Every Child Matters agenda. You
are leading the way in your own areas in building the effectiveness
of collaboration through children's trusts. We recognise the need
to improve joint working in DfES, particularly between our own
Directorates and reflecting our recent Capability Review. At the
same time we need to improve alignment across Government, working
with other Departments, especially the Department of Health and
Home Office to visibly support improved outcomes for children
and young people.
In summary, we have undertaken to communicate
better to schools their crucial role in safeguarding and in supporting
integrated children's services, while keeping their special focus
on achievement. We plan to tighten up our programme delivery by
coordinating activities better here, and by better briefing to
government offices so that they can support you locally. We will
strengthen our monitoring of local authority performance, so that
we can—together with you—target support more effectively
and step up a gear in pursuing measurable outcomes.
We look forward to debating this agenda with
you—and will have the opportunity to do that with some of
you at next week's National Children and Adults Conference
in Brighton. Do tell us if you think we should be doing more
or different things—or if you think we need to do more to
deliver on the commitments we are making.
We look forward to working with you to improve
outcomes for children and young people.
Tom Jeffery and Ralph
Tabberer
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