child support service

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child

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engage

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These are times of great change in our education

community and times of great challenge. Schools

of all types are faced with new and sometimes

daunting opportunities and possibilities to provide

the best service to their children.

Chief amongst these new opportunities is the question of how best to meet the needs of our most vulnerable and challenging young people. Every school has a cohort of young people whose domestic, social, learning or

emotional needs make education an ongoing struggle. In the new landscape these needs can be increasingly hard to meet.

Schools today are faced with a number of competing priorities and leaders have difficult choices to make when thinking about how best to maximise the achievement of all the young people in their school. Taken together with the reduction in local authority support services these choices can often feel overwhelming and isolating.

In this climate it is vital that schools work together to support each other in meeting what are expensive and varied needs of the most challenging cohorts.

It is in this spirit that the Short Stay School for Norfolk is pleased to launch its new Child Support Service. This school to school service will enable schools of all types to access a high quality support service designed

specifically to meet the demands of the new reality. Our service is designed from experience and research to meet the needs of vulnerable and challenging young people and their families, whilst at the same time being accessible to schools of all types and offering a service which aligns with the priorities of aspiring and ambitious school leaders.

I hope very much that you find our brochure informative and useful, however if you would prefer a face to face conversation please do not hesitate to get in touch.

Yours

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The Short Stay School (SSSfN) is an extraordinary and diverse school which caters for young people throughout the county of Norfolk and beyond. We are an all through environment whose students and pupils range from the ages of 5 to 16. Like many traditional schools we have a number of sites, which in our case are spread across the county in order to ensure good local services for the schools and communities we serve.

The Short Stay School has 3 main functions. Primarily we provide education and support for young people who have been permanently excluded from school. The needs and profile of these young people vary tremendously but in the majority of cases our role will be to prepare them for return to a new school within a couple of terms or transition them to a specialist environment which can best meet their needs.

Our second main function is to provide education and support to Norfolk young people who are unable to attend school owing to their medical needs. Again this is a wide and varied field which encompasses those with both physical and emotional ill health. Across the county specialist teams of staff work with young people in their homes and in our bases as well as in hospital.

Finally the SSSfN is an educational base for children who are missing education. We provide educational packages for any child in Norfolk who is without a permanent school place until such time as their school place can be finalised. In this role we cater for a diverse population which includes those who are new to the county or the country as well as those with significant learning difficulties. Our staff team includes a wide range of highly experienced teachers and support colleagues whose expertise lies in offering flexible solutions to some of the most challenging families in our community. We are very used to working with the hardest to reach and the most reluctant to engage and we are keen to share this expertise with our partner schools.

Many schools will already be familiar with our work as we have had positive partnerships with many schools in Norfolk for a number of years. However we are now looking to deepen and expand those relationships as we move into a new phase of our work. The creation of our Child Support Team is a key milestone for us in developing new

partnerships with schools to better support vulnerable and challenging young people.

About the SSSfN

The Child Support Team (CST) is a dedicated team constructed with the aim of providing a high level of support and intervention to the most challenging young people. We have drawn on 10 years of experience working with this cohort as well as trying to learn the lessons of previous school support incarnations. In particular we have tried to create a service whereby as much support as possible can be drawn from within the team itself rather than relying on external referrals with the inevitable time delays. Being able to offer a time efficient and effective response to issues is at the heart of the CST model.

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As a subscribing school you will have a local Senior Specialist Support Assistant to whom you can refer any young person from your school. You will make referrals using the Short Stay School referral form with which you are already familiar. The SSSA will then arrange to offer advice or undertake an initial observation. Upon completion of an initial assessment the SSSA will draw up an agreed intervention plan. These plans will routinely last for 6 weeks but may be subject to extension depending upon need.

The intervention plan may include :

• In class support from an SSA • CAF initiation from PSA

• Assessment from Educational Psychologist • Assessment from Clinical Psychologist • Staff training in specific strategies

• Support with SRB referral or SA1 application • Provision of evidential report for

Annual Review

• Support with completion of Risk Management Plan

• Support with implementation of PSP • Onward referral to STEPS or other support • Therapeutic input from Psychologist

How will the service operate ?

In addition to the service outlined above subscribing schools in each sector will receive the following:

Primary Sector

Free unlimited advice and support.

Free access to onsite assessment (Spotlight) sessions at the Short Stay School bases.

Secondary Sector

Free unlimited advice and support.

Free access to onsite sessions which will run for half days or whole days.

2 permanent placements per academic year for students at the point of permanent exclusion. These will be made available as an alternative to Permanent Exclusion.

Phase Specific offers

The Team comprises :

Behaviour Support Leader

This is an experienced qualified teacher and senior leader who understands the often conflicting demands of classroom practice and meeting the needs of the more vulnerable learners. The Behaviour Support Leader will have overall

responsibility for the management and leadership of the CST and will be available to offer school

improvement advice in the key area of behaviour and pastoral care.

Senior Specialist Support Assistants

Our team of SSSAs provide the detailed experience in the team. They will respond quickly to referrals and undertake initial observations and draw up

intervention plans. The SSSAs will be the main point of contact for subscribing schools and will manage the provision on a day to day basis.

Professional Support

The CST will have its own team of psychology and mental health professionals who will be able to offer professional assessments of young people who exhibit mental health issues as well as offering a high level of expertise and advice in working with and catering for those with emotional ill health. Our professionals will be part of the CST and will not require further external referral. Intervention from the team will be available as part of the intervention plan

Educational Psychologist

The CST will have access to its own EP resource. Although this will not be a full time post in the team the EP will be available to provide professional assessment and advice and guidance where appropriate. The EP will be part of the CST and will not require further external referral.

Specialist Support Assistants

Our team of SSAs are experienced members of support staff who are proficient in providing in-class support for challenging and vulnerable young people. They will be available to offer in-class support for young people referred by subscribing schools and can offer both direct support as well as modelling strategies for school staff and offering training.

Specialist Parent Support Advisors

The CST has its own team of PSAs who are available to work with the families of referred young people. The PSA will be able to work alongside PSAs in subscribing schools offering additional support in dealing with what are often the most challenging families as well as being available to lead CAFs and run parenting courses for subscribing schools. The PSA team will be focussed on

resolving those issues outside of school which often have such a detrimental effect on the behaviour of young people.

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The CST model has been created with the explicit aim of providing a one stop package of support for schools which allows you to adequately meet the needs of the most vulnerable and challenging. The service is designed to be reactive to the needs of subscribing schools and reflects the experience and extensive research we have undertaken in the best ways to support schools and vulnerable young people.

We are keen to have further input from our subscribing schools and will actively seek the involvement of schools’ representatives in shaping and expanding our service.

Meeting the needs of our

subscribing schools

Subscribing to the CST means that your school can clearly show how you cater for the needs of the most vulnerable groups in your school. The CST will provide your school with clear data to illustrate the value added by their interventions and we will support you in tracking the

improvements made by supported children. At inspection time the CST will be available to demonstrate to inspectors the commitment your school has made to the most vulnerable and challenging young people as well as being able to provide clear evidence of the impact and

effectiveness of that intervention.

All services from the CST are provided as part of a single subscription package and minimise the need for multiple contracts with a variety of support bodies. A subscription to CST by a maintained Norfolk School is effectively cost neutral as the cost will be equivalent to the amount delegated to that school by the local authority to purchase behaviour support. Where schools are actively working together in federations or clusters we can provide additional bespoke packages of support for that grouping.

The benefits of subscribing

Norfolk Maintained Schools

The Child Support Service will be funded on a subscription model. Each school will be offered the opportunity to subscribe to the service at a cost calculated using the same formula used to calculate the amount of funding delegated to schools for behaviour support. This will mean that each school will be charged the same amount that they have been delegated to purchase

behaviour support. In effect this makes the service cost neutral.

Norfolk Academies

The subscription cost for Norfolk Academies will be calculated in the same way as for maintained schools and will be equivalent to the amount they would be delegated if they were a

maintained school and the amount they receive within their LACSEQ.

Clusters

Where all schools within one cluster choose to subscribe, a cluster rebate of 10% will be available.

Independent or Non Norfolk schools

Costs for independent or non Norfolk schools will be calculated on the basis of student numbers and are available upon request.

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Notes

The Locksley School

[email protected] 01603 508520

The Brooklands School

The Rosebery School

The Douglas Bader School