UPDATE NO 445 19 March 2021

Take Your Place – the future leaders programme for the South East

Take Your Place: Free Leadership Training – The CPD opportunities we have developed with the Staff College are free at the point of access. SESLIP have purchased a subscription which includes free places on the following courses:

• Women in Leadership 24 and 25 March 2021
• Black and Asian Leaders 23 and 24 June 2021 

The first Take Your Place workshop went ahead on 1 March. It was well attended with seventeen people representing twelve of our nineteen authorities. Feedback included that attendees thought the workshop was ‘inspiring’ and ‘exactly what future leaders need’. Thanks to Alison and Lucy for devising and delivering the session. If you are interested in supporting the programme as it develops please contact Mark Evans (details below).

• Women in Leadership 24 and 25 March

The Women in Leadership Programme is designed to create a safe space for women to connect, share their experiences and learn how to strive and thrive in their own work places. There are some key issues that affects every woman along the path of her career. The Programme helps to address some of the issues that affect all females by providing a forum that considers the unique challenges women encounter

• Black and Asian Leaders 23 and 24 June 

This programme aims to: Provide strategies to help participants overcome barriers and enhance their skills to be able to thrive as Black global majority leaders; Renew self and group confidence, which is often depleted by every day racism; Enable participants to learn about and try out for themselves different leadership approaches and understand how these relate to their own values and principles; Ensure participants develop their own personal learning plan in order to help them progress in their careers.

The courses are being run virtually (via Zoom). We have booked two cohorts of both workshops. To book places please contact Mark Evans (details below)

Perplexing Presentations (PP)/Fabricated or Induced Illness (FII) in Children Guidance from RCPCH

The Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health Child Protection Portal (RCPCH) has published new guidance which provides best practice advice for paediatricians in the medical management of PP and FII cases to obtain better outcomes for children.

Since the publication of the RCPCH guidance on Fabricated or Induced Illness by Carers (FII) in 2009, there have been significant developments in the field. The RCPCH Child Protection Companion 2013 extended the definition of FII by introducing the term Perplexing Presentations with new suggestions for management.

This new guidance provides procedures for safeguarding children who present with perplexing presentations and FII and offers practical advice for paediatricians on when and how to recognise it, how to assess risk and how to manage these types of presentations in order to obtain better outcomes for children.

The full guidance is available here and it helpfully defines

• Medically Unexplained Symptoms (MUS) (and its synonyms Non-organic symptoms, Functional illness, Psychosomatic symptoms);
• Fabricated or Induced Illness (FII) (and its synonyms Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy; Pediatric Condition Falsification; Medical Child Abuse; Parent-Fabricated Illness in a Child; (Factitious Disorder Imposed on Another, when there is explicit deception)); and
• Perplexing Presentations (PP)

Slough Children First – Board Vacancies

Slough Borough Council and Slough Children’s Services Trust are relaunching the trust under the name Slough Children First and are advertising for a board chair and 3 x non-executive directors.

The adverts can be accessed here for chair (closing date 6 April) and here for non-executive directors (closing date 16 April). The recruitment is being managed by Nancy Scott or Elise Kanareck on 020 7426 3370 at GatenbySanderson.

Ofsted and SEND: Revisits to areas with a written statement of action will start from April 2021.

Dimitris Solomonidis writes:

Dear colleagues

We are now able to share with you the news story about the restart of Area SEND re-visits and full inspections. Thank you again for your engagement and contribution to shaping our thinking and approach on the restart. We should be grateful if you would help circulate this announcement through your existing channels, such as newsletters, blogs, websites and social media accounts.

Many thanks and best wishes, SEND policy team

Revisits to areas with a written statement of action will start from April 2021.

Full inspection will resume from June 2021.

Ofsted guidance for inspectors is here

Future dates for Network meetings

Lead Members Group: More information from Alison Michalska (contact details below)

Data Benchmarking: Tuesday 13 July 2021. More information from Alastair Lee (contact details below)

Adoption and Special Guardianship Leadership Board: Tuesday 20 April 2021. More information from Rebecca Eligon (contact details below)

AD Education: Friday 7 May 2021 – 10.30am. More information from Chris Owen (contact details below)

AD Safeguarding: Friday 11 June 2021. More information from Mark Evans (contact details below)

QA Network: More information from Diane Williamson (contact details below)

Fostering Network: 10.30am Thursday 12 April 2021. More information from Rebecca Eligon (contact details below)

SEND SE19: Covid conversation #17 -24 March 2021 12:30-13:45 (LAs). More information from Tracey Maytas (contact details below)

Quality Assurance Network News

The Quality Assurance Network met on Wednesday 10 March. 

Chris Owen (convenor of the regional education network) joined the group for a helpful discussion about Children Missing Education and quality assurance activity in this area.

The group shared their responses to the ministerial letter about the increase in infant injuries.

Next steps: Feedback is sought about the opportunity for QA thematic challenge to be added to SESLIP thematic challenge offer (thanks to our colleagues in the South West for sharing their work).  

Next meeting: June 2021, date tbc

Commissioners’ Network for the SE

Thank you to colleagues from East Sussex, Medway, Oxfordshire, Reading (BFfC), Surrey, and Windsor and Maidenhead (AfC) who have signed up to the Commissioners’ Network. which is working alongside the DfE Phase 2 project, but is planned to have a life of its own in the future.

If you would like more information, please contact Isabelle Gregory (details below), who is convening the group, and preparing to launch webpages and contact lists on this website later this month. 

DfE Project Phase 2

Our DfE funded commissioning project (phase 2) asked for the views and priorities of the participating local authorities earlier this year, and we have now moved to engaging with potential providers. On Tuesday 9 March (through West Sussex) a market survey was launched open to all providers. We are trying to encourage maximum participation from independent providers; the survey is introduced by Lucy Butler (DCS, West Sussex) who said,

“Help us to make commissioning and procurement better. We’d like you to give us your perspective on these challenges, with a view to shaping a new way of working together with providers, as partners. The questions that follow have been designed to collect your insights, anonymously if you prefer, although no individual respondent will be identified in reporting of the combined feedback.”

Survey publication: 9 March 2021
Online workshop event and one-to-ones: 16 and 23 March 2021, 10.00 – 11.30, 14.00- 16.30

The survey is open until 26 March; registration for the events and one-to-ones is available towards the end of the questionnaire, so please ask providers to go to the market survey and answer the questions in order to access the opportunity to meet our project team. The outcome of this survey will inform the development of the proposals for a formal stage of co-production later in the project.

Both ICHA and NAFP are sending the link to their members and so we are hoping for a good response from which to build proposals going forward

The invitation has also been advertised on the SE Shared Services e-Sourcing Portal. Enter “CWSCC – 032323” in the search box to bring up the notice.

More information from Rosemary Perry (contact details below).