Agenda item

To consider a report of the Quality Assurance Principal Manager and Monitoring & Intervention Manager.

Mark Bayley, Quality Assurance Principal Manager and Anne Gadsden, Monitoring and Intervention Manager attended to firstly update the Committee on the systems that were in place to monitor underperforming schools and secondly to outline the process and impact of the Improving Outcomes Programme.

Mark Bayley explained that there had been a number of changes to the relationship between local authorities and schools, particularly with regard to monitoring and improving performance. He noted that a recent reduction in school improvement funding to Local Authorities had resulted in a major review of school improvement functions. A result of this was the retention of a small monitoring and intervention team with a commissioning budget to secure intervention strategies where required.

Anne Gadsden moved on to discuss the information provided in appendix c which outlined details on the schools being supported by Cheshire East through the Improving Outcomes Programme.

It was noted that several primary schools had not met the 60% SATS floor target for Level 4 in English and Maths. It was queried therefore why all of these schools were not in the Improving Outcomes Programme. Mark Bayley explained that it was only schools with yearly cohorts of over 10 pupils that were judged against the target criteria.  

Attention was drawn to the fact that no information had been provided on what Cheshire East was doing to improve ‘coasting’ schools. It was suggested that it would be useful to have ‘value added’ information in future reports so that ‘coasting schools’ could be identified. Mark Bayley explained that it had been difficult to provide this information as the definition of a ‘coasting school’ was unclear. He reported that the Department for Education were due to publish some guidance on ‘coasting schools’ and when this was available, information would be incorporated into future reports.

It was suggested that when a school receives an Ofsted report, the relevant ward Councillor(s) should be informed and briefed by officers so that any constituent queries could be answered. Indeed, it was also suggested that ward Councillors should be informed of any problems in schools in their area.

It was queried why Oakefield Primary School was being allowed to expand its pupil number when it was in special measures. Anne Gadsden explained that Cheshire East were confident in the leadership team at the school to deliver on the expansion. She also noted that there was a population ‘hot spot’ in the area and therefore an expansion was necessary.

As a final point, Fintan Bradley drew attention to the fact that the landscape between schools, local authorities and performance had changed considerably in the last couple of years. He noted that there had been a significant erosion of national strategies and advising bodies and that Cheshire East only had three officers doing work related to school performance on behalf of the local authority.

The Committee accepted this point but suggested that it was important that detailed school performance figures needed to be circulated so that informed questions could be asked regarding educational disparities in Cheshire East. It was also suggested that updated versions of appendix c be brought to subsequent Committees as part of any future general performance reports. As an aside, it was suggested that it would be useful to include the date of publication for the OfSTED report when it is referred to in the table.

RESOLVED –

a)    That the report be noted

b)    That when a school receives an OfSTED report and/or when a school has a number of issues identified, the relevant ward Councillor be made aware and adequately briefed.

c)    That detailed performance data relating to Cheshire East Schools be circulated to Members when available.

d)    That ‘appendix c’ be brought back to the Committee as part of the regular performance report and that this include the date of publication for respective OfSTED reports.