New Community Schools Prospectus

Annex B: The focus on the child and wider working in partnership

The Government considers that New Community Schools will prove to be a significant development of lasting impact, but the development of partnership approaches to the problems of educational underachievement and social exclusion should not be confined to them. Many of the Government's educational initiatives have a community aspect _ the present early intervention programme includes a significant amount of home learning and family literacy. Study support schemes enjoy community support. Schemes being developed under the alternatives to exclusion programme have stressed multi-agency working. There are examples of partnership working to tackle educational underachievement in the New Life Partnerships, Priority Partnership Areas (PPAs) and Regeneration Programme areas, both in the implementation of specific initiatives and the development of education strategies for the areas. This will be continued with Social Inclusion Partnerships (SIPs) which will promote inclusion through a multi-agency approach. The Government wishes to facilitate further this kind of co-operative approach to improving the educational prospects of the most vulnerable and is ready to consider any further proposals on how it can best stimulate this to complement the pilot programme for New Community Schools.

There are other related initiatives which partners should be aware of when developing proposals.

Very Young Children - the Government is committed to an expansion of family centres with a focus on 0-3 year olds and their families. Good quality childcare offers developmental benefits for children from the earliest age through stimulating play and an opportunity to mix with others. But parents too can benefit from support - in terms of ready access to expert advice and mixing with other parents. This expansion will be focused on areas of greatest need helping children later to take maximum advantage from the planned learning that pre-school education provides.

Pre-school expansion - pre-school years are an important and distinctive phase in a child's education experience. A well planned pre-school learning experience enriches the quality of children's lives, prepares children well for primary school and has a positive impact on later educational attainments, emotional maturity and social development. The Government therefore wishes to see all children whose parents wish it to benefit from pre-school education from the term after their third birthday. They are therefore committed to providing access to a part-time quality education place for every pre-school year child by winter 1998, and every three year old by 2002.

Partnerships around pre-school - partnership in the supply of pre-school education is, in the main, with parents and private and voluntary sector providers. Many authorities have well developed procedures for consulting parents. This is essential to ensure that authorities know what parents want and what their children need. Most authorities have entered into formal partnerships with the private and voluntary sectors for the provision of pre-school education. The places commissioned in this way have, primarily, been to meet parents' needs for all-through education and associated day-care in the one place to enable them to take up work or training opportunities. Authorities will want to consider the opportunities for offering this type of service from New Community Schools.

Early Intervention Programme - the Government is committed to ensuring that children acquire the basic literacy and numeracy skills they require to access all later stages of the curriculum. The Early Intervention Programme has assisted every local authority in Scotland to devise and implement an early intervention strategy appropriate to local needs and circumstances. These strategies are targeted at children in the first two years at primary school to support them in acquiring the basic learning skills and to raise their expectations and levels of attainment. Recently announced additional resources will permit every local authority to expand and give greater depth to its early intervention strategy.

The Government is committed to reducing exclusion from school. All schools should adopt an inclusive approach - where all pupils are treated equally and offered an educational experience they value. The target is the reduction of the number of exclusions by one third by 2002. Education authorities have been asked to develop strategies and local targets so that this target can be reached. The Alternatives to Exclusion Grant Scheme was introduced in 1997 by the Government to stimulate and support practical initiatives providing alternatives to exclusion. £3m was made available to authorities over three years to pilot innovative schemes. The Government recently announced that a further £23m is to be made available to ensure that appropriate provision can be made for pupils who have been excluded, or are at risk of exclusion.

Out of school hours learning - or study support - can make a real difference. Study support is activity outside normal lessons which helps pupils to reach higher standards - this can mean homework clubs, breakfast, lunch and evening clubs, and summer and holiday schemes. The Government is committed to the development of study support. The New Opportunities Fund (the sixth National Lottery good cause) will commit £23m - including £2.3m for integrated projects involving both childcare and learning activities - for out of school hours learning activities in Scotland. The bulk of the funding will be made available before 2001. The objective is to fund projects involving half of all secondary schools and special schools and quarter of all primary schools. Second, the newly established Scottish Office Excellence Fund will provide £27m for study support in the three financial years from 1999-2000. The objective is to ensure that study support activities are available in all secondary schools; where comprehensive provision already exists in secondary schools, the resources should be used to assist primary schools.

Out of school hours childcare - ensures that each day a safe and stimulating environment is available for children out of school hours while parents work or are involved in training. The Government's Childcare Strategy recognises the importance of childcare both in helping parents balance work and family life and in providing a positive experience for children. The aim is to increase substantially the provision of accessible, affordable, quality care. Local Childcare Partnerships are being asked to draw up local childcare plans. Funding will be available to support the start up costs of out of school childcare facilities from the New Opportunities Fund. The £25.3m for this includes the sums mentioned above for integrated childcare and learning activities. Local authorities are being funded to help with drawing together new projects and will also be able to provide some support to facilities which are unlikely otherwise to be self-sustaining.

Scotland's Health Green Paper gave a new emphasis to tackling the roots of health inequalities, with education identified as one of the main settings. Recent guidance to the National Health Service in Scotland has committed the service to putting children at the heart of its work to improve health and reducing health inequalities. Work on health promoting schools, new lottery funding for healthy living centres (some of which could be school-based) and new support for training primary school teachers in drugs education will also support New Community School development.

Health Improvement Programmes - in 1997 a new process for health service planning was introduced in the NHS. A formal structure was put in place whereby Health Boards now take the lead in working together with NHS agencies, local authorities and other relevant local organisations to produce a Health Improvement Programme (HIP) for improving health and tackling health inequalities in their area over a 5 year period. These Programmes offer the opportunity for the development of a fully co-ordinated approach to promoting health. They will be particularly useful therefore in ensuring a comprehensive health contribution to Community Plans and in providing a sound base from which Health Boards can develop their involvement in the New Community Schools initiative.

The Education for Work Agenda the Government launched the national Education for Work agenda on 7 November 1997, confirming its commitment to preparing young people for the world of work. The agenda underlines the value which the Government attaches to partnerships between education and business, and builds on strong Scottish traditions of giving young people the knowledge, skills and attitudes to succeed in working life. Working closely with national and local education business partnerships, and with a wide range of businesses including major international companies, the education for work agenda will promote improvements in the quality of preparation for working life for every young person in Scotland.

Schools and Community Education - there has been a variety of approaches over many years to collaborative work between schools and community education from which valuable lessons have been learned. Two important aspects are the provision of support to parents which enables them to be involved in education; and direct work with children and young people. While work may be directed towards children and young people in difficulty it should be seen as having general application across the school system and in the community. The introduction of New Community Schools offers an opportunity further to develop collaborative work between schools and community education. For example, home/school/community link programmes have been found to be particularly valuable in engaging pupils and parents in a partnership with the school and each other. Much of the focus of this is in work with children and young people to help with emotional, social and educational problems. This can involve close liaison with teaching staff and other professionals. There are many excellent examples of partnership working. Some involve and support parents in their child's education. Others may offer through informal programmes support to parents and young people who are under-achieving, dropping out or have social problems.

The Review of Community Education, the findings of which are shortly to be announced, recognises that the expertise of education professionals with experience of working in informal settings, often in multi-disciplinary teams and partnerships, should be at the heart of initiatives to improve social inclusion. These techniques can contribute to the work of other agencies, and help them to engage with individual and community learning needs.

The Secretary of State has announced that £16m is to be made available in 1999-2000 to support the work of new Social Inclusion Partnerships (SIPs) across Scotland. In addition, pathfinder projects to test out innovative ways of tackling exclusion at a local level will be developed under the New Deal for Communities programme.

The Scottish Social Inclusion Network includes Government officials, representatives of key external organisations, and individuals with direct, personal experience of tackling social exclusion, has been established to help the Government develop its strategy for social inclusion, and provides a forum within which agencies can discuss and co-ordinate their efforts to promote social inclusion. The Network is also directing preparations for a conference on social inclusion later in the year.

Community planning - the report of the joint Scottish Office and Convention of Scottish Local Authorities Community Planning Working Group proposes that councils and their key partners in the local public sector and beyond should come together in partnership to develop a plan which will set out a shared vision of the priorities facing the area and the contributions which each partner can make to attaining that vision. This is an important part of creating 'joined up government' at local level in a way which is attentive to the priorities of communities and citizens. It should help to ensure that the various partners whose activities affect the social, economic and environmental well-being of an area are pulling together in the same direction to meet people's needs. Community planning is being piloted in 5 council areas this year (Edinburgh, Stirling, Perth & Kinross, Highland and South Lanarkshire) and will then be implemented across Scotland.

Children's Services Plans are required under Section 19 of the Children (Scotland) Act 1995. The plans should focus on the needs of vulnerable children who require the support of services under that Act. These mainly cover services for children in need (as defined in Section 93(4)(a) of the 1995 Act) and children looked after by the local authority. It also includes children not so defined whose welfare can be promoted by the provision of social work services. The plan should be a corporate enterprise bringing together the range of local authority services. There is a requirement on local authorities to consult health boards and trusts, voluntary organisations, the principal reporter, children's panel chairman, housing agencies etc. The aims of the plan are to safeguard and promote the welfare of children; to clarify objectives for services; to promote integrated provision of services and effective use of available resources; and to establish high standards of co-ordination, co-operation and collaboration between service departments within local authorities and with other agencies and organisations.

New Community Schools are the logical extension of, and are complementary to, these developments and offer the opportunity to demonstrate the effectiveness of a truly integrated approach combining inputs from education, social work and health as a minimum. The Government expects that the pilot New Community Schools will in due course act as a catalyst for wider change.