This tool was published / updated on 18 March 2010 and includes information that was relevant at that time.
This toolkit has been designed to help councils improve the educational outcomes of looked after children. Improvement can be achieved by using rigorous, honest self-assessment of current outcomes and processes. This will identify key areas to focus on and help to develop plans for improvement, using available guidance and the views of stakeholders - especially those of children and young people.
The toolkit was originally developed during 2003/04 by the Audit Commission with support from an external reference group and has been revised twice since then taking into account the evaluations of some councils and Audit Commission staff that have used it. The latest revision was in March 2010. The downloadable pdf version of the toolkit can be saved for use in places without web access and to make printing easier.
Changes in legislation and guidance such as Improving the Educational Attainment of Children in Care (Looked after Children) (external link) have also informed the new version of the toolkit.
What's in the toolkit?
Central to the toolkit is a self-assessment against good practice in seven areas for investigation. The downloadable self-assessment tool will generate spreadsheets and charts to show the council's progress against the areas for investigation. An action plan is also provided.
We encourage councils to test their initial findings with a range of reality checks. This will help ensure that there is evidence on the ground of actions which benefit young people to back up the self-assessment findings. In order to facilitate this, a range of tools for checking outcomes is included:
- An attendance survey, including downloadable guidance, forms and spreadsheets.
- Case tracking exercise.
- Data formats for analysing local data on looked after children and comparing with national data.
- Survey of looked after children and young people, including a suggested questionnaire.
Various guidance documents can also inform the assessment and web links to them are included in the areas for investigation as appropriate. An evaluation form is also provided for councils to provide us with feedback about the usefulness of this toolkit.
All councils are expected to actively manage their performance by setting targets for improvement and monitoring progress against these. Responsibility for improvement lies with everyone involved in the delivery of services, from those at the front line to those who hold strategic responsibility and ultimate accountability for outcomes and service standards.
Aspects of the toolkit will be of value to everyone working with looked after children. However, overall, self-assessment will be of particular value to corporate parents, to scrutiny committees, those who hold corporate responsibility for the educational achievement of looked after children, virtual school heads, schools and children’s trusts.
Carrying out the self-assessment itself will not improve any outcomes, but using it to identify strengths and weaknesses will help focus attention where action is most needed. Councils, schools and their partners then need to plan and implement changes to improve outcomes.
Do we need to use it?
This toolkit should be used in the context of the Statutory Guidance on the duty on local authorities to promote the educational achievement of looked-after children (external link) (section 52 of the Children Act 2004) and Improving the Educational Attainment of Children in Care (Looked after Children) (external link).
Most councils have taken action in recent years to improve education outcomes for looked after children. However most have not achieved the extent of improvement they and the government intended and that the children and young people in their care deserve. Legislation and guidance now makes action by councils imperative and even those councils where outcomes have improved will demonstrate their commitment to continuous improvement through rigorous self-assessment.
For those councils where a high level of risk is established the involvement of the council's Audit Commission Comprehensive Area Assessment Lead (CAAL) could be helpful in deciding whether to involve Audit Commission staff in supporting a review of performance.
For example, outcomes for looked after children are particularly poor relative to outcomes in similar councils, and this may have been highlighted in the annual performance assessment by Ofsted or in the Comprehensive Area Assessment or in the Council’s annual organisation assessment.
How do we use it?
There is no single answer to the question of how to use the toolkit that will be appropriate to all councils. The toolkit may be used in its entirety over a short period of time; individual themes may be explored over a longer period; or a quick ‘health check’ may immediately identify one or two themes for in-depth focus.
We have suggested a programme plan, which is set out below, but in the end it is for councils to decide how best the toolkit can be used in their particular circumstances.
Before any council embarks on self-assessment, we suggest there are some basic principles and practicalities that need to be agreed to ensure that the process is suitably rigorous - without such rigour the self-assessment will not deliver improvement. Those who have worked with the toolkit already have suggested the following as essentials.
- High level ownership
For this process to be seen to be important, senior officers and relevant councillors must give it high importance and ensure that the profile of the work is prominent.
- Partners
The achievement of looked after children is a partnership responsibility under the duty to cooperate. The increasingly central role of Children and Young People’s Partnerships (Childrens Trust) in the delivery of services emphasises the need to involve partners. The self-assessment will make most impact where high-level engagement with partner agencies enables the effectiveness of partnerships to be gauged, with the messages heard and understood by senior representatives of partner agencies.
- Stakeholder groups
A reference group of key stakeholders, including looked after children, and sponsors will help keep the review on course, provide effective challenge and help ensure an effective outcome.
- Time
In order for adequate depth and breadth of enquiry, and for high-quality reporting, it is suggested that between 10 and 15 days are required to carry out the work.
- Links
Ensure links with other relevant strategies, reviews and self-assessments, including those completed for the APA and the CAA, with the Children and Young People's Plan and with local needs assessments.
- Other resources
A dedicated base away from the everyday business is helpful; some administrative support in advance to arrange an efficient timetabling schedule and solicit and organise documents will help efficiency; and arrangements to survey, visit, interview and record evidence from parents, carers, children and other stakeholders need to be set in place.
- Avoid vested interests
It is essential to ensure that key personalities, however well intentioned, are not able to influence the output unduly.
- Facilitation
Having a skilled, external facilitator to provide continuity and challenge can add great value - even more so if the council can find sufficient resource to enable an appropriate external agency to actually carry out the work - so ensuring objectivity and avoiding the potential bias referred to above.
- Follow up
It is essential to establish at the outset how findings and recommendations will be used to generate an action plan, with resources identified to implement change.
Bearing these in mind, this is a suggested approach to the use of the self-assessment toolkit.
- Ownership
The decision to use the toolkit is taken by a leadership group (chair/corporate parenting group, portfolio holder, Executive Director, Heads of Service). Key Partners are involved. Arrangements for action-planning, resourcing and implementation are agreed in principle.
- Project management
An appropriately senior independent officer/external consultant is commissioned to manage the self-assessment within an agreed budget of resources and over an agreed timescale.
- Steering group established
A stakeholder group is identified and involved at the outset in approving the scope of the work, setting the agenda, providing challenge, agreeing timescales, reporting and other involvement.
- Key staff group established
The project manager identifies and meets a group of relevant council staff to scope the work, identify links to other strategies, reviews and self-assessments and ensure that all requirements for the efficient and effective completion of the work are in place. A timetable of interviews, documentation and mechanism of selecting case files is agreed.
- Self-assessment
This includes document reading, surveys, interviews, and reality checks in order to complete the self-assessment KLOEs.
- Action plan produced
The toolkit provides an outline action plan against KLOEs. It is recommended that specific recommendations for improvement are included. A presentation to a high-level panel is essential (for example, leader, portfolio holders, chief executive, relevant senior officers).
- Improvement plan agreed
A senior team agrees the action plan and identifies the resources necessary for implementation.
- Monitoring
An agreed schedule of monitoring and review is put in place to track progress against the action plan.