Presentation of the Director of Education

This presentation provides further information on work to reduce the number of school exclusions, including the national review.

The Committee received a presentation of the Director of Education which provided information on work to reduce the number of school exclusions, including the National Review.

The main points and themes within the presentation included:

• The National Review of Exclusions;
• Information gathered from multi-agency consultations;
• The four strands of the draft strategy (universal, early intervention, alternative provision or specialist support and ensuring best practice in the use of exclusion; and
• Next steps.

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

• Whether a breakdown of the types of schools which were excluding children was available;
• The allocation of financial resources and how much was being allocated to support children attending Pupil Referral Units (PRUs) and children at risk of permanent exclusion;
• Concern about the level of exclusion and the percentage of those being excluded who had Special Educational Needs and Disability (SEND);
• The importance of identifying and supporting children with challenging behaviour at primary level, even if their behaviour was more manageable at that age;
• Whether it was difficult for pupils attending a PRU to return to mainstream education and how many secondary school children who were permanently excluded returned to mainstream schools and how many were in long-term alternative provision; and
• The new Ofsted Framework due to be introduced in September 2019.

The Director of Education reported that a breakdown of data on school exclusions could risk identifying individual children and, therefore, could not be shared widely; however, she advised that this information had been provided to the Chair previously and could be provided again.  She advised Members that it was difficult to draw conclusions on the types of school which were more likely to exclude pupils as most exclusions took place at the secondary school level and most secondary schools in Manchester were academies.  She informed Members that the Executive had approved plans to allocate £20 million of basic needs funding to invest in SEND provision and alternative provision.  She reported that the Council had also invested significantly in the Primary PRU, which had now moved to its new purpose-built premises at Plymouth Grove, and she suggested that the Committee might want to visit this.  She also outlined other possible sources of funding, including an application for additional funding from central government, discussions with schools which had a significant under-spend and consultation with schools on whether 0.5% of the schools budget could be allocated to the high needs budget.

The Virtual School Head Teacher advised the Committee that it was important to ensure schools had the knowledge and skills to recognise what pupils’ behaviour might be communicating about their unmet needs and what adjustments schools could make.  She outlined how the Virtual School had worked with a number of schools to prevent Our Children (Looked After Children) from being excluded, including identifying underlying Social, Emotional and Mental Health (SEMH) needs, making reasonable adjustments and putting in place additional resources, where necessary.  She advised Members that schools wanted more training on the impact of adverse childhood experiences, trauma and attachment and informed Members of a current pilot scheme taking place to train schools in this.  She confirmed that high schools, primary schools, special schools and PRUs were involved in this pilot.

The Director of Education confirmed that children did return to mainstream schools after attending a PRU.  She reported that, where the PRU was confident that the child was able to return to mainstream education, a school was identified for the child via the In-Year Fair Access Protocol.  She informed Members that the PRU would continue to support the child, with the child often being dual rolled at the school and the PRU for a period of time until they were confident that the placement was working out.  She reported that the situation for primary school children was more challenging, advising that permanent exclusions at primary school age were unusual and the excluded children often had very complex needs and ended up attending specialist provision.

Decisions

1.            To request that a visit be arranged to the Primary PRU at its new premises.

2.            To request that the Director of Education share school-level data on

           exclusions with the Chair.

3.            To request that information on the final destination of pupils who attended the  

           Secondary PRU following permanent exclusion be circulated to Members of

           the Committee.

4.            To note that the Committee has previously requested a training session on the    

           Ofsted Framework and that, as a new Framework is due to be introduced, this

           training will be held once details of the new Framework are known.

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