Meeting documents

Recommendation

That the Education and Skills strategy be ratified by Cabinet.

Mr M Appleyard, Cabinet Member for Education and Skills introduced the Strategy and highlighted the following:

• The strategy highlighted the key areas that needed to be addressed.
• Recognising that families had an enormous impact on the way children live their lives and that early help where needed was crucial. 
• Outcomes were for all children and outside of academic success ensuring they had the skills for adult life.
• The Council were not yet measuring non-academic education but needed to look at how the Council could do that.
• Buckinghamshire were well provided for education and does well in national figures, however there were key areas that needed to be addressed. 
• Mr Tett stated that the figures in the report were not accurate and would be updated.
• Mr Tett highlighted to residents that the Council were no longer the education authority due to the large number of schools that were now academies and were managed by the Regional Schools Commissioner on behalf of the Department for Education.  Relationship with those schools that were not academies were not managed so stringently by the County Council due to changes in funding grants.  The County Council role in school improvement had also changed significantly.

Mr T Vouyioukas, Executive Director for Children’s Services and Mrs M Edmonds, Education Strategy Manager, attended the meeting.  Mr Vouyioukas highlighted the following points:

• The role of the Local Authority had been changing for some time in its role as facilitator for School Improvement.
• 95% schools rated as good or outstanding (not 94% as stated in report). Within Early Years it is 97%
• Mr Vouyioukas referred to page 117 of the Strategy, third bullet relating to above national rate of inadequate schools, since the report had been produced further schools had been inspected and the Council were now at 1.3% compared to the national average of 2%, the report would be updated.  Mr Vouyioukas noted how proud and impressed he was by the calibre of the leadership within schools.
• The Strategy is designed on a schools led system and relied on schools working collaboratively and learning from each other.

Cabinet raised and discussed the following points:

• Discussions were had regarding the Council being a fully selective system and for clarification of this to be discussed outside of the meeting.
• The treatment of free schools to be the same as any other
• A Member asked about the County Council’s relationship with the Regional Schools Commissioner, who was responsible for school improvement in academies. Mr Vouyioukas stated that the relationship with the commissioner in Buckinghamshire was successful, engaged and working well with the local authority.  Mr Vouyioukas highlighted that as Executive for Children’s Service it was also his responsibility as well as the Commissioners to make contact with any school where there was concerns about performance.
• Budget pressures on small rural schools were highlighted and a Member asked that as they were high achieving and popular with parents, could it be re-emphasised that it was policy not to close any of Buckinghamshire rural schools.  Mr Vouyioukas confirmed that was correct.
• Questions were raised regarding University Technical Colleges (UTCs) and how they could add a diverse choice to the County.  Mr Appleyard stated that they had some difficulty attracting children due to the starting age of 14 when students were already in secondary education elsewhere.  Mr Vouyioukas stated that it was important to identify those students whose needs would better met by attending a UTC.
• Multi Academy Trusts (MATs) were also discussed and how resources could be better shared across them.
• High exclusion rates within the report were also raised and a Member asked if there was a benchmark for this.  Mr Vouyioukas confirmed that the data in the report was based on 2015/16 figures and a national benchmark was available with t Buckinghamshire comparing favourably to South East partners.  Mr Vouyioukas noted that exclusion was also the last resort.

Recommendation

That the Education and Skills Strategy be ratified by Cabinet.

RESOLVED:  Cabinet RATIFIED the Education and Skills Strategy.