Agenda item

The Strategic Director of Social Care and Education submits a report to summarise the educational outcomes and attainment of Leicester’s Looked After Children during the academic year 2021/22. It considers their achievements and the support provided by the Virtual School Team to achieve the best learning outcomes.

The Strategic Director of Social Care and Education submitted a report summarising the educational outcomes and attainment of Leicester’s Looked after Children during the academic year 2021/22

Deputy City Mayor Councillor Russell, Social Care and Anti-Poverty introduced the report referring to the recent celebratory event to recognise looked after children’s achievements and providing details of those achievements and the support provided by the Virtual School Team.

It was noted that these Looked after Children, who often faced considerable challenges and trauma, were being given significant additional support by the virtual school to increase their educational performance and achieve positive outcomes.

7.10pm Councillor Khan and Councillor Willmott left the meeting.

Attention was drawn to the notable achievements, enrichment activities, and cultural activities which included involvement with organisations such as the Curve theatre, Frog Arts and Big Mouth forum as well as the work around transitions between primary and secondary schools and provision of opportunities to access learning.

7.15pm Councillor Willmott re-joined the meeting.

Members of the Commission welcomed the report and the provision of data which they felt was very impressive.

Members queried if there were issues with some schools providing the right level of support to Looked After Children (LAC). It was advised that sometimes a child would not have the right level of support as they were in and out of schools due to placements moving but each school had dedicated responsibility for LAC and sometimes, they were just getting to know that child so the challenge in the virtual school team was working with those schools to ensure continuity and there was a significant amount of training with teachers to ensure the same awareness for the child.

Key priorities of the virtual school were noted. Regarding the support given to foster carers and designated teachers it was advised that there was various support in place for foster carers. Educational elements formed part of the foster care programme and there were regular training opportunities within that programme. As an example, the virtual school offered key stage 1 support such as phonics and was providing that support to the foster carer in the same way a school offered it for parents thereby making sure foster carers had as many tools as possible to support the educational journey of children in their care.

It was advised that foster carers were greatly engaged, and they were present and celebrating with the children at the celebration events. There was also great engagement with kinship carers and carers in children homes too looking after all the children and all of them were keen and supporting the child’s educational journey.

Members noted that the virtual school worked with all children who are looked after, from pre-school early years to age 16 and beyond. In terms of post 18 year olds, for some young people the normal time line to pass specific exams etc didn’t work and so there was more flexibility to enable a break from formal education with opportunity to go back when they were more settled, and it was about making sure educational options were in place for them to access and having options for them to engage in the world more broadly.

The Chair noted that in broad terms there seemed to be over-representation of white children in the virtual school cohort and queried whether that suggested that BAME children’s needs were not being identified or if there were other factors.

Deputy City Mayor Councillor Russell (Social Care and Anti- Poverty) responded that across the whole population of LAC there was a higher population of white children, and that was also reflected across the country with children brought into the care of local authorities disproportionately more likely to be from a white British economically challenged background.

The Director of Early Help agreed there was disproportionality in the figures and there were some hypotheses around that, but various agencies were yet to reach any conclusion as to why that was so. Work was being done to track children from their initial referral to services to the point at which they became looked after and the reasons behind that were found to be different across different authorities, although it had been established that children were not being taken into care because of their background. Assurance was given that although there was disproportion that was not because BAME children’s needs were being missed.

The Chair thanked officers for the report.

AGREED:

That the contents of the report be noted.