14 December 2017 weekly update

Dear Colleagues

School Funding

I am pleased to inform you that next Tuesday 19 December the Cabinet Member for Children, Young People and Education intends to make a decision in relation to school funding arrangements for 2018-19 and the steps we are taking to move towards implementing the national funding formula (NFF). A proposed record of decision is currently available here

These set of changes to our local funding formula are based on the recommendations made by the Schools’ Funding Forum at their meeting on 1 December. These recommendations were informed by the views of all schools who responded to last month’s consultation on this subject. The headline changes to our local funding formula are as follows:

• Retain the lump sum at £120,000 per annum for 2018-19 and 2019-20
• Move to the NFF rates for basic entitlement, FSM eligibility, IDACI, English as an Additional Language and Sparsity, all from 1 April 2018.
• Introduce Minimum Funding Levels for Primary schools at £3,200/pupil in 2018-19, increasing to £3,400/pupil in 2019-20 and for Secondary schools at £4,500/pupil in 2018-19, increasing to £4,700/pupil in 2019-20.
• Introduce Ever6FSM factor in Primary schools at £232 per eligible pupil in 2018-19, increasing to £324 per eligible pupil in 2019-20. In relation to Secondary, £373 per eligible pupil in 2018-19, increasing to £471 per eligible pupil in 2019-20.
• Increase the Low Prior Attainment rates for Primary schools at £651 per eligible pupil in 2018-19, increasing to £733 per eligible pupil in 2019-20. In relation to Secondary, £1,058 per eligible pupil in 2018-19, increasing to £1,193 per eligible pupil in 2019-20.
• Remove the Looked After Child factor from 1 April 2018
• Set the Minimum Funding Guarantee percentage at -1.5% for 2018-19 and 2019-20.

In addition we are intending to increase the Growth Budget in 2018-19 by £2m to help fund the additional revenue costs associated with basic need growth within the County. And finally we intend to transfer 0.5% of the Schools Block into the High Needs Block to help meet some of the pressure experienced from rising demand in the number of pupils with Special Educational Need and Disability.

I hope that providing you with this high level picture on the changes to our local funding formula enable you to calculate the impact that these changes may have on your individual school budget next year and the year after. The illustration tool that we provided as part of the consultation is still available here

Once this decision has been taken, and the school level data has been provided by the Department for Education, we will calculate individual school budgets for 2018-19. Please note that this stage of finalising school budgets might result in small changes to the rates mentioned above. We intend to publish your final 2018-19 budget, along with an indicative 2019-20 budget, on Kelsi at the end of February 2018 and we will inform you via a separate communication when these are available.

If you have any further questions please contact Simon Pleace, Finance Business Partner for Children, Young People and Education 03000 41 69 47 or email Simon.Pleace@kent.gov.uk.

Green Paper on Transforming Children and Young People’s Mental Health Provision

The Green Paper was published on 4 December 2017 and is welcomed by Kent County Council and Kent’s Clinical Commissioning Groups. This article provides headlines from the Green Paper, an overview of work already happening in Kent, where you can find out more and how to respond to this consultation.

The Green Paper acknowledges that schools and colleges can, and do, play a vital role in identifying mental health needs at an early stage, referring young people to specialist support and working jointly with others to support young people experiencing problems.

The proposed approach, aimed at strengthening schools and colleges role, has three core elements:

1. A Designated Senior Lead for Mental Health to oversee the approach to mental health and wellbeing and provide rapid advice, consultation and signposting. This role will be able to access funded training.
2. New Mental Health Support Teams, supervised by NHS children and young people’s mental health staff and linked to groups of schools and colleges. They will provide additional capacity for early intervention, ongoing help for those with mild to moderate mental health needs and promote of whole school approaches to mental health, working closely with school nurses. Schools, colleges and the NHS will manage their work jointly.
3. A new four-week waiting time for access to specialist NHS children and young people’s mental health services in the pilot areas.

These core elements will be supported through:

• changes to teacher training;
• the inclusion of mental wellbeing in PHSE;
• measuring the impact of what schools already do including through Ofsted inspection;
• proposals around social media and internet safety linked to the Internet Safety Strategy Green Paper
• support for family interventions
• support for 16-25 including their transition to adult mental health services.

The Government aims that by the end of 2022-23, a fifth to a quarter of the country will be operating with these reforms.

A summary of the Green Paper can be found here (DOCX, 28.6 KB)

The Department of Health is inviting feedback on the Green Paper by noon on 2 March 2018. We will be responding to the Green Paper and we encourage individual schools to also respond.

What is already happening in Kent?

A five-year programme to improve the mental health of children and young people in Kent has already started. This puts Kent in a good position to take advantage of the new policy proposals.

The Transformation of Children and Young People and Young Adults Emotional Wellbeing and Mental Health Plan for 2017-18 has been developed using Public Health data and evidence reviews as well as extensive stakeholder engagement.

The Plan has the following foci:

• Resilience and Reach
• Early Intervention and Prevention
• Specialist Support
• Crisis Care.

In focusing on Reach and Resilience, the Plan recognises the need to challenge stigma and build the knowledge and skills necessary to promote children and young people’s emotional resilience.

Key to this is HeadStart Kent, a programme funded by the Big Lottery Fund, which is testing approaches to increasing resilience of 10-16 year olds, an age when mental health conditions often start. The programme is building collaborations between school leaders, measuring children’s emotional health and testing whole school approaches to emotional resilience through a Resilience Toolkit. This includes the identification of at risk young people as well as building skills of staff. HeadStart Kent resources for young people, for parents and carers and for all professionals are available on the HeadStart Kent Resilience Hub

The Good Mental Health Matters campaign is also in its second phase, developing a resource for schools to start the conversation about emotional wellbeing and the everyday practical things CYP can do to stay mentally healthy.

A commitment to early intervention has resulted in a new model of mental health service delivery including the Single Point of Access (SPA) which puts children, young people, their carers and parents, as well as professionals, in direct contact with a clinician who can get them to the right service.

The Single Point of Access for Children and Young People’s Mental Health Interventions is: 0300 123 4496

A new model for providing Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) in Kent will be delivered by the North East London Foundation Trust (NELFT) in partnership with the Kent Community Hospital Foundation Trust and the School Health Service. The new delivery model for interventions will be driven by five needs led pathways; Early Help; Behaviour; Mood and Anxiety; Complex Needs; Neuro-developmental.

This strengthened approach to early intervention also includes the new School Public Health Service, which can be accessed through the SPA. The service delivers health assessments in Year R, Year 6 and Year 10 which identify children and young people who would benefit from additional emotional health support. Overcoming the stigma of self harm is being addressed through ‘ Mind and Body’ programme which proactively identifies young people through whole year screening. Understanding health and education colleagues' respective roles and responsibilities is being helped through the ‘Schools Link’ programme being delivered by the Anna Freud Centre.

Making improvements to the mental health of children and young people in Kent presents a huge challenge which we all need to be engaged in. The active involvement of education colleagues in emotional and mental health programme development is always valued. If you would like to be part of these new areas of work or have feedback, please contact Jo.Tonkin@kent.gov.uk.

Ofsted Annual Report 2016/17

Ofsted published its Annual Report today and we can compare Kent’s performance with the national averages. The report covers the breadth of Ofsted’s inspection and regulation responsibilities in education and care.

Overall, of those schools with an Ofsted judgement, both Primary and Secondary schools achieved higher than the national and the south east average when it came to Ofsted inspections. 92% of our eligible Primary schools were judged to be good or outstanding by Ofsted as at 31 August 2017 compared with 90% nationally and 91% in the south east.

89% of the Kent Secondary schools that have an Ofsted judgment were judged to be good or outstanding as at 31 August 2017 compared with 79% nationally and 83% in the south east. This makes Kent the second best performing county in the country in terms of Secondary school Ofsted outcomes.

I am pleased that these results show Kent pupils have access to some of the best schools in England. All staff, governors, pupils and parents should be very proud of their achievements.

Matt Dunkley CBE
Corporate Director
Children, Young People and Education