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Welfare officers provide vital defence

    Opinion
  • Monday, September 6, 2010
  • | CYP Now
Education welfare officers (who go by the glorious acronym of EWOs) provide a lifeline to vulnerable schoolchildren, and there are calls this week for their contribution to be properly recognised.

Shhh... Every Child Matters lives on

    Opinion
  • Monday, August 9, 2010
  • | CYP Now
Watch out, the language police are about. An internal Department for Education memo lists 30 terms the government wants consigned to history, and the words that should be used in their place. Many relate directly to children's services.

Children's chiefs key to school reform

    Opinion
  • Friday, July 9, 2010
  • | CYP Now
As the government ploughs full steam ahead with the expansion of academies and free schools, the strategic educational role of local authorities is clearly under threat.

Can good services remain standing?

    Opinion
  • Monday, June 21, 2010
  • | CYP Now
Like the suffocating drone of vuvuzelas, cuts continue to dominate the atmosphere in the children's services arena and in public services more generally.

Less money, but much more purpose

    Opinion
  • Friday, June 4, 2010
  • | CYP Now
The Association of Directors of Children's Services' (ADCS) policy paper, which outlines some priorities to Education Secretary Michael Gove, is compelling and constructive in how the sector can do more with less while meeting government objectives.

Sector must influence the coalition

    Opinion
  • Monday, May 17, 2010
  • | CYP Now
They say that a week is a long time in politics. Quite. As predicted in these pages for many months, the new Tory Secretary of State Michael Gove has renamed the Department for Children, Schools and Families (DCSF) as the Department for Education.

Election result prolongs uncertainty

    Opinion
  • Monday, May 10, 2010
  • | CYP Now
At the time of writing -- on the historically uncertain afternoon of Friday 7 May -- the Conservatives were about to enter into negotiations with the Liberal Democrats about helping them to form a government.

Every Child Matters faces biggest test

    Opinion
  • Monday, April 19, 2010
  • | CYP Now
The Association of Directors of Children's Services (ADCS) pledged, in its annual report last week, to assess and build on the progress of Every Child Matters (ECM) for the next five years, as a policy priority for the coming 12 months. It is a good priority to hold, particularly given the uncertainty ahead.

Gove gives joint working a rude jolt

    Opinion
  • Tuesday, April 6, 2010
  • | CYP Now
Michael Gove's revelation to CYP Now that a Conservative government will remove obligations on local authorities to have children's trusts in place will come as a thunderbolt for children's services, particularly in their efforts to safeguard children and enable them to thrive.

Neet strategy is not fit for purpose

    Opinion
  • Monday, March 8, 2010
  • | CYP Now
At last week's Generation Neet debate, CYP Now aimed boldly to identify "how to solve the problem of young people not in education, employment of training (Neet)" via a panel of politicians, experts and young people. Of course, we didn't actually solve the problem.

Outstanding challenge for Ofsted

    Opinion
  • Monday, February 1, 2010
  • | CYP Now
Ofsted-bashing has been on the rise for several months. Cries of exasperation over the way the children's services inspectorate goes about its business have come in fits and starts from all quarters.

Class and race merit more attention

    Opinion
  • Monday, January 25, 2010
  • | CYP Now
The underachievement of white working-class children has justifiably become a cause for national concern. Plenty of schools are making great strides to tackle the issue. Nevertheless, it has led to declarations, most recently from Communities Secretary John Denham, that social class is the most significant factor in determining school achievement rather than ethnicity.

No easy answers in 21st century learning

    Opinion
  • Tuesday, December 8, 2009
  • | CYP Now
UK Youth hosted a conference at Windsor Castle at the end of November on the future of learning. Chaired by yours truly, it sought to examine and debate what kinds of learning young people need for the 21st century, including "non-formal" learning.

It's time to respect children's rights

    Opinion
  • Tuesday, November 17, 2009
  • | CYP Now
You wait ages for one 20th anniversary, then three come along at once. We've just marked the fall of the Berlin Wall and the 1989 Children Act. And this week it is 20 years since the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child came into existence.

Education is the antidote to racism

    Opinion
  • Tuesday, October 27, 2009
  • | CYP Now
The bear-baiting of British National Party (BNP) leader Nick Griffin in his recent appearance on Question Time did nothing to advance race relations in our country.

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