18 July 2025 weekly update

Dear Colleagues,

My last bulletin of the academic year and a big thank you to those of you who are reading.

Community of Schools (COS) and COS Provision Maps

I was delighted to join the Chairs of the Communities of Schools yesterday, who are playing such an important role in the transformation of the SEND system across Kent. Their feedback was invaluable, as always, and it was heartening to see first-hand their commitment, enthusiasm and problem-solving approach. We are continuing to develop resources and guidance to support the Communities and I previously shared the link to the draft SEN Continuum of Provision of Needs and Provision (PDF, 454.1 KB).

The focus is now on gathering clear information about the support and resources available from the Professional Resource Group and specialist settings. This is being collated centrally on the COS Provision Map format (DOCX, 18.1 KB).

For September, each Community will be provided with their own personalised Provision Map which will enable individual schools and the Community to have a clear overview about support and services that can be accessed, and how. From that starting point, the Provision Map can then be owned and developed further by each Community through the collaborative discussions in COS meetings to map and record resources, expertise or support that schools can offer and share with each other. A really big thank you to Dr Alison Ekins and others involved in taking this important piece of work forward.

The meeting was hosted by The John Wesley Methodist and Church of England Primary School Ashford. It was lovely to end the year in a school to the sounds of children playing and singing in the background. I was really interested to see on the school website their commitment to Courageous Advocacy, more here if you are interested. Many thanks to headteacher Rachael Harrington, who is also on the of the Chairs, and her team for hosting the meeting.

Post-16 reform - Pathways for All

Great to meet up with colleagues from across the sector to evaluate the work of the Pathways for All programme and to plan for the next year, led by Chair Charlie Guthrie, Chief Executive of the Endeavour Trust. We discussed the achievements to date of the Board's strategy, No Young Person Left Behind (PDF, 507.4 KB) and the focus for the next year.

You will know there were presentations at the summer term headteacher briefing meetings and these generated interest from a number of primary headteachers. We want to follow up on that interest and, working with the Invicta Chamber of Commerce, we will be making information available about businesses that are willing to come into school to talk about what they do. This is just one of the very practical suggestions to come out of the session, look out for more next term!

Next year...

I have mentioned previously that Ofsted will be attending the Autumn term headteacher briefings to share developments and we are also hoping Dame Christine Lenehan will be providing an update on SEND developments as the new White Paper is due to be published in October. We are planning for an input from Lianne Lucas, the teacher involved in the Southport stabbings who earlier this year launched the Let's be blunt campaign.

To complement this, in a new informal lunchtime Teams session I will be interviewing Mark Vickers MBE, Chief Executive of the Olive Academy Trust and Ofsted's external adviser on Inclusion to get his thoughts on effective leadership.

Finally, I am absolutely delighted to let you know that Trauma Surgeon and Clinical Director Violence Reduction, NHS England (amongst many other roles) Martin Griffiths CBE has also confirmed he is happy to share his views on leadership. Martin works at every level in the system, from influencing government, through to supporting the voluntary sector and working with individual youngsters who have been stabbed and their families, pioneering a public health approach to supporting them, so I know his reflections will be well worth hearing.

Early Years Review

As the academic year draws to a close, I would like to extend my sincere thanks to all involved in the Early Years community for your dedication and hard work throughout this period of change.

Since the Early Years Review began, you have collectively navigated a complex landscape with a shared commitment to improving outcomes for our youngest learners. Your efforts in embracing change, engaging in professional dialogue and laying the groundwork for a more inclusive and responsive system are deeply appreciated.

While there is still progress to be made, the achievements to date are significant. Thank you for your continued professionalism and support as we move forward together.

I look forward to building on this momentum in the year ahead.

And finally...

I met with the chair and vice chair of KALE this morning and we agreed we are conscious of a change with much greater collaboration right across Kent and we are jointly upbeat and optimistic about the future, despite all of the challenges overcome and in the future.

A huge thank you for your engagement and all your various contributions. I very much hope that you can see how you have shaped all of the many developments we have finalised over the year.

I also want to take this opportunity to thank my team - my support team Kirsty and Dante who keep the show on the road and make sense of potential chaos, as well as my education and SEN leadership team and staff who have worked tirelessly, remained positive, created solutions, gone the extra miles, given me invaluable advice and made me laugh at critical times 🙂

Have a great break everyone!

Best wishes

Christine McInnes
Director of Education and SEN