Agenda item

The Board received a report from the Strategic Director – People, which provided the annual update of the educational challenge, position and outcomes for Halton children for 2019-20.

As a note of caution, Members were advised that this year had been an unusual and challenging one due to the impact of Covid-19.  Data was not available this year as many statutory assessments were cancelled nationally and any individual school level data would not be comparable to previous years’ data.  Further, it was commented that due to the outbreak of Covid-19 and the subsequent response, there had been many changes to educational provision, assessment and examinations during 2020 and the validated national results would not be published this year.

The report provided Members with detailed information in the following areas:

·         Statutory Assessment and Exam Result Key Issues;

·         Educational Challenges for September 2020 onwards;

·         Changes to 2020-2021;

·         The National Tutoring Programme (NTP); and

·         The Catch Up Premium.

Following the presentation Members queried:

How would the National Tutoring Programme work – this was a Government funded sector led initiative to support schools to address the impact of Covid-19 on pupils learning.  An amount of £350m was allocated nationally towards the Programme which would make high quality tuition available to schools and support pupils who had missed out the most as a result of school closures.   The Programme would be led by a collaboration of five charities;  schools would select which programmes they accessed, with many schools across Halton using evidence based programmes from the Education Endowment Foundation.

How would the Catch Up Premium work – this was a further £650m to ensure that schools had the support they needed to help all pupils make up for lost teaching time and was designed to mitigate the effects of the disruption caused by the Pandemic.  It was only available for the 2020-21 academic year but would not be added to schools baselines in calculating future years’ budgets.

Were there any pupils in Halton that were home tutored and did not get any results – there were no instances of this reported in Halton but this would be confirmed.  It was understood that the onus was on the parent to follow through with exams and register at exam centres.

The late results for the Btecs were a concern as well, were any pupils disadvantaged because of this – most students had College places on courses they wanted and there were no reports of anyone being without a place that wanted one.

Were there any decisions made on next year’s exam timetable considering the impact that Covid-19 will have on the cohort of pupils taking these – no announcement had been made to date on this; the Board would be advised of any update.

Was there any indications on when the Ofsted inspections would resume – these inspections were put on hold following the lockdown and many Ofsted staff were redeployed to other areas.  However visits would resume in the Autumn term to schools in special measures or those inadequate at the last inspection; schools would be sampled across all Ofsted grades and compliance and regulatory visits would be made where needed.  Full inspections were planned to resume from January 2021.

It was reported that one Academy Trust school had volunteered to be visited so the findings of this pilot visit would be shared with the Board.

RESOLVED:  That the Board notes the information provided and comments made.