30 April 2026 weekly update

Dear Colleagues,

I am really pleased to have the opportunity to write to you. As you know I have been working as Interim Corporate Director since November and more recently have taken full DCS duties on an interim basis. As a consequence, leaders in the Education and SEND division have taken on writing the introduction to this bulletin. I'd like to take this opportunity to thank my colleagues for their contributions and I hope you enjoy reading them as much as I do. I am now included on the Kelsi e-bulletin rota and so you will be hearing from me too from time to time.

Cabinet members

Cllr Beverly Fordham continues as the Cabinet member for Education and Skills, with Cllr Luke Evans as deputy. Cllr Fordham continues to prioritise visits to education settings across the county. Talking to a wide variety of education leaders enables Cllr Fordham to bring particular insight and challenge to our work as we navigate through the current complex policy landscape. A big thank you to Cllr Fordham for her tireless enthusiasm and commitment.

Following a reshuffle there has been a change in Cabinet Member for Children's Services. Thank you to Chris Palmer for her work leading this important area since June 2025 and who has moved to the role of Deputy Member for Adult Social care. Welcome to Cllr Paul Webb who replaces Cllr Palmer, working with Deputy Cllr Pamela Williams - the full Cabinet can be seen on the KCC website

Visits 

My own number of visits have sadly dwindled for now as I have focused on my new role but  I have managed to squeeze in a few since I last wrote.

Starting with the early years, despite working with the Headteacher of Northfleet Nursery School Neerasha Singh for a number of years in her role as Chair of the High Needs Funding Sub Group of the School Funding Forum and as an Inclusion Champion, it took me until last term to visit Kent's only nursery school. It was delightful to see our young learners having such a rich offer and thriving. Neerasha and her team also run one of only two Early Years Stronger Practice Hubs in the South East region. We are continuing to work with Neerasha to fully integrate the work of the Hub into the wider reform of KCC early years services. A big thank you to Neerasha and her team for their time.

I was delighted to get to see The Spires Academy, part of the Orion Trust, in action and to meet with Principal Anna Burden and trust leaders when I visited with David Adams, Interim Deputy Director - Effectiveness, Sufficiency and Skills. It was helpful to have a greater understanding of the pupil community including how they are working with the St Nicholas special school satellite. It was also great to see the academy hosting a Communities of Schools SEND leaders meeting. I need to confess I am an Orion Education Trust secret shopper in a way, as my grandson is a year 9 pupil at one of the Trust's London secondary schools. I was really pleased to share with Simon Garrill, CEO, that my grandson is thriving academically and socially thanks to the outstanding work of staff to engage the pretty disenfranchised year 8 pupil that was admitted in January 2025. The Trust prioritises social mobility as a key value and has put that into practice by widening access and strengthening opportunity across its schools including making changes to their admissions policy and all schools within the trust now prioritise pupils eligible for the pupil premium for 20% of available places. This work has been recognised through a Sutton Trust Fair Admissions Gold Award in March this year. If you'd like to find out more, see the Orion Education website

Farming is an important  part of the Kent economy and so I was really interested to visit Curly’s Farm and School, an independent special school on the Isle of Sheppey during half term, when the work of the farm continues. Head of charity Kyle Ratcliffe kindly took me on a tour and talked through how their nurturing and inspiring environment positively impacts on children and young people aged 5 to 19 who have special educational needs and/or disabilities. A big thank you to Kyle for his time and a fascinating afternoon which did include stroking some of the lovely animals.

Finally, I was privileged to attend the launch of the first national Marmot Coastal Region in Dover, which is a multi-agency programme led by Public Health and focused on improving employment opportunities for residents. KCC started working with the Institute of Health Equity in 2026 to investigate the impact of coastal poverty and identify interventions that could lead to improvements and if it's of interest there is more information in the date-led report and in the Executive Decision Report. Related is a resource to support conversations with children about poverty which I came across which may be of interest.

Legislation and Policy 

The Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Act 2026 received Royal Assent on Wednesday 29 April following a prolonged parliamentary process. This will have far reaching impact particularly in social care and safeguarding and we have been working on preparing for implementation for some time. From a personal perspective I particularly welcome the changes to Elective Home Education. A briefing on the key aspects of the legislation (PDF, 231.0 KB) is available.

With regard to SEND, thank you to all who are participating in the co-construction of the reform plan which needs to be submitted in it's first draft mid May. DfE guidance is now being published, we are considering the implications and reflecting expectations in our development work.

Other news

Many of you will be aware of the changes that the Integrated Care Board, our key health partner, has been going through over the last year. The new structure is being finalised currently and we are re-establishing the strong relationships and governance structures we had previously. With such severe reductions in budget the ICB is reviewing it's spending and we are talking with lead officers to promote the benefits of programmes which are delivered in schools funded by the ICB including for example I-Thrive and This is me. We will keep you posted on developments as they unfold.

And finally ...

With a renewed interest by government in closing achievement gaps, this article describing a three year project with a 15 primary school trust in Bedfordshire which included targeted writing and speech-and-language interventions, family support partly to improve attendance and CPD so teachers felt able to promote pupils motivation and resilience. Improvements in relationships with parents as well as the confidence of pupils to take on challenges were noticed by teachers as well as progress towards reaching KS2 attainment on a par with national expectations.

Enjoy your Bank Holiday!

Best wishes

Christine McInnes
Interim Corporate Director, Children, Young People and Education