Report of the Strategic Director, Children and Education Services

This report provides an overview of the progress with the development and planned implementation of a multi-agency Promoting Inclusion and Preventing Exclusion Strategy for Manchester.

The Committee received a report of the Director of Education which provided an overview of the progress with the development and planned implementation of a multi-agency Promoting Inclusion and Preventing Exclusion Strategy for

Manchester.

Officers referred to the main points and themes within the report which included:

• The context of this work, including data on permanent and fixed-term exclusions at Manchester primary and secondary schools in comparison to national figures;
• An overview of the strategy; and
• Next steps.

Some of the key points and themes that arose from the Committee’s discussions were:

• To welcome the strategy;
• To request a breakdown of the reasons for exclusions;
• What was being done to address off-rolling;
• The importance of ensuring that school governors were trained on school exclusions and off-rolling;

·         To request further information on the independent review of the use of fixed-term exclusions in the specialist provisions across the city for young people who experienced Social, Emotional and Mental Health Needs (SEMH), including the Secondary Pupil Referral Unit (PRU), and to ask for the number of fixed-term exclusions from the Secondary PRU which had taken place this year; and

·         To note the positive examples in the case studies and ask how widespread this good practice was.

The Director of Education reported that, once the latest data on school exclusions was available, the reasons for exclusion could be provided to the Committee.  The Head of School Quality Assurance and Strategic SEND informed Members that, following their questioning at a previous meeting of the number of exclusions classified as being for ‘other reasons’, officers were now going back to any schools which gave ‘other’ as a reason for an exclusion to obtain more precise information.

The Head of the Virtual School reported that off-rolling had been covered in the national Timpson Review of School Exclusions and was also addressed in this Strategy and she outlined conversations which were taking place with schools on this issue.  The Director of Education informed Members that the issue of off-rolling had been incorporated into the new Ofsted Framework and that schools were likely to be judged as inadequate in the leadership and management category if they were found to be off-rolling children.  She advised Members that Ofsted had made it clear that it was only acceptable for an agreement to be made to remove a pupil from the school roll when this was in the child’s best interests, otherwise it would be classed as off-rolling.  She reported that officers were using Chair of Governor briefings and other meetings to inform governors about the new Ofsted Framework and about the role of governors in identifying patterns and trends which suggested that off-rolling could be taking place in their school and challenging this.

The Head of School Quality Assurance and Strategic SEND reported that former Her Majesty’s Inspectors (HMI) were supporting the review of fixed-term exclusions in specialist provisions, including the Secondary PRU, but that there had been a delay due to the health issues of one of the former HMIs.  She advised Members that the report had been expected to be completed by the end of this half-term but that this might now be pushed back.  She offered to circulate statistics on the number of fixed-term exclusions from the Secondary PRU this year to Members of the Committee.  She also informed Members that the Council had been heavily engaged with the PRU over the last term in relation to the Promoting Inclusion and Preventing Exclusion Strategy and that the PRU had been fully engaged and supportive of the Strategy. 

The Head of the Virtual School reported that there was a large amount of good practice taking place across the city and outlined some of the models including Rights Respecting Schools, the Adverse Childhood Experiences pilot and Mentally Healthy Schools.  She reported that this work needed to be mapped and good practice shared across the city.  The Executive Member for Children and Schools reported that it was planned to have a launch event for the Strategy in the Autumn term, including workshops where best practice could be shared.  He offered to circulate the date of the launch event to Committee Members when it had been decided.  He also informed Members that a national day of Rights Respecting Schools would be taking place on 4 July.  The Chair requested that information on the Rights Respecting Schools national day be circulated to Members of the Committee.

Decisions

1.            To note that the national Timpson Review of Exclusions Report has now been published and the recommendations contained therein are welcomed and are reflected in Manchester’s Promoting Inclusion and Preventing Exclusion Strategy.

2.            To note that the provisional school exclusions data for 2018-19 shows a reduction in the use of permanent exclusion compared to the 2017-18 data following the increased focus and challenge.

3.            To request a further report on citywide school exclusion performance once the 2017-18 validated exclusions data is published, including information on the reasons for exclusions.

4.            To request that this report include an update on the independent review of the use of fixed-term exclusions in the specialist provisions across the city for young people who experience Social, Emotional and Mental Health Needs (SEMH), including the Secondary Pupil Referral Unit (PRU), and information on the destinations of pupils at the PRU.

5.            To request that the figures on fixed-term exclusions from the Secondary PRU this year be circulated to Members of the Committee.

6.            To note that the Executive Member for Children and Schools will circulate the date of the Strategy launch event and to request that Members also be provided with information on the national day of Rights Respecting Schools.

[Councillor Stone declared a personal interest as a member of the governing body of the Secondary Pupil Referral Unit.]