News Insight: Children's Services - The state of services is laid bare
Tuesday, November 25, 2008
Ofsted's annual report last week showed that there have been improvements across the sector, but it also flagged up areas of significant concern. Ross Watson examines what the findings mean for the children and young people's workforce.
Ofsted released its annual report on the state of children's services last week, and despite improvements it is clear there is still much to do.
Chief inspector Christine Gilbert says: "There is much that's encouraging but some of these things we are seeing year after year. I am absolutely not satisfied."
Safeguarding is a big concern since almost half of all serious case reviews were judged inadequate. They are taking too long, restricting the opportunity to learn from them.
Also of concern is the fact that eight per cent of independent schools that are not members of the official association were judged as inadequate on securing the welfare, health and safety of pupils.
Early years and childcare presented a positive picture, with more than two-thirds of providers good or outstanding. Michael Hart, Ofsted's director of children, is keen to push this further. "We want even those local authorities where there is quite a lot of good provision to see how they can reach the highest levels," he says. But quality of childcare dropped in disadvantaged areas and again child protection was the most common reason for parental complaints.
Education showed large improvements. However, the gap between the best and weakest schools is still not narrowing, and almost one in ten secondary schools were reported to be inadequate. Miriam Rosen, Ofsted's director for education, attributes this to the size and complexity of secondary schools, making them hard to turn around. "Some secondary schools can have 100 staff and it's maybe necessary to effect changes in the whole senior leadership. Sometimes they don't have a full senior leadership team and need to recruit new people," she says.
The report also said that the majority of youth offending teams (YOTs) demonstrate good and improving partnership arrangements. However, it said there is inconsistency in the degree to which YOTs carry out and use initial assessments of young people who have become known to them.
