Summary of evaluation of the
educational psychology service
Clackmannanshire Council
13 October 2009
Definition of terms used in this report.
HM Inspectors use published criteria when making evaluations. They are published as
quality indicators which relate evaluations to six levels. HMIE began using a six-point
scale to make evaluations in August 2005. The table below shows how the six-point
scale relates to the four-point scale that we used previously.
Old level
Very good
Good
New level
Excellent
Very good
Good
Fair
Unsatisfactory
Satisfactory
Weak
Unsatisfactory
Description
Outstanding, sector leading
Major strengths
Important strengths with some areas for
improvement
Strengths just outweigh weaknesses
Important weaknesses
Major weaknesses
This report also uses the following words to describe numbers and proportions:
almost all
most
majority
less than half
few
over 90%
75-90%
50-74%
15-49%
up to 15%
Contents
Page
1.
The aims, nature and scope of the inspection
1
2.
What key outcomes has the service achieved?
1
3.
How well does the service meet the needs of its
stakeholders?
2
4.
How good is the service’s delivery of key processes?
3
5.
How good is the service’s management?
4
6.
How good is leadership?
6
Appendix 1 - Quality indicators
8
1. The aims, nature and scope of the inspection
Recommendation 20 of the Review of Provision of Educational Psychology Services in
Scotland (2002) charged HM Inspectorate of Education (HMIE), on behalf of the
Scottish Ministers, to provide an external evaluation of the effectiveness of the
Educational Psychology Service (EPS) in improving the impact and outcomes for
children, young people and families.
The inspection of Clackmannanshire educational psychology provision was undertaken
on behalf of stakeholders. The evaluation of EPS was conducted within a framework of
quality indicators which embody the Government’s policy on Best Value. The inspection
team also included an Associate Assessor who was a principal educational psychologist
(PEP) serving in another Scottish local authority.
This web-based report should be read alongside other strategic inspections of
Clackmannanshire Council which sets out the wider context in which EPS are delivered.
The Educational Psychology Service
The Clackmannanshire EPS was based in Alloa. At the time of inspection the service
consisted of a PEP and 3.6 full-time equivalent educational psychologists (EPs). A
senior educational psychologist (SEP) was due to join the service in August 2009. A
transition coordinator was also based with the service. The EPS was supported by
1.6 full-time equivalent administration staff.
2. What key outcomes has the service achieved?
The EPS had improved services for children and young people through significant
contributions to policy and practice within the authority. It had played a strong role in
improving attainment and achievement, supporting regeneration and transformational
change in schools. The EPS Philosophy for Children initiative underpinned cooperative
learning in schools to support Curriculum for Excellence. High priority had been given
to supporting transitions, young people at risk of missing out and looked after and
accommodated children (LAAC)1. The EPS was appropriately involved in overseeing
the implementation of the Additional Support for Learning (ASL) legislation. Effective
links with the Children’s Reporter were in place. EPs had significant roles in
contributing to children’s services planning, Getting it right for every child (GIRFEC)2
and developments with child and adolescent mental health. Continuous improvements
in performance were well-planned and clearly evidenced by regular surveys of the views
of service users. As a result of very effective early intervention and therapeutic services
provided by the EPS, fewer children and young people needed to be referred to Child
1
2
The term ‘looked after’ in this report includes all children looked after or looked after
and accommodated by the Council.
The GIRFEC approach aims to ensure that centres, schools and educational services
work more closely with partner agencies so that all children get the help that they
need when they need it.
1
and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS). The EPS had been very successful
in building schools’ capacity to aid early identification of need. EPS initiatives, including
Synthetic Phonics and Thinking Skills had resulted in improved attainment levels in
literacy across primary schools. The available performance information should be
collated and made accessible to demonstrate trends over time.
The EPS complied fully with appropriate statutory and professional guidance. All EPs
had received appropriate levels of training in Child Protection. Parents, children and
young people valued the advocacy support which EPs provided for them.
3. How well does the service meet the needs of its stakeholders?
The EPS put the wellbeing of children and young people at the heart of all its work.
Well considered initiatives including the Early Additional Reading Support programme
(EARS) and Playing and Learning to Socialise (PALS) had been very effective in
ensuring that children and young people were included and participating, achieving,
attaining and progressing. EPs were highly skilled at communicating with children and
young people and were successful in ensuring that their voices were heard at meetings
where important decisions were being made, for example, at times of transition. The
EPS ensured that parents, carers and families were treated equally and fairly, and were
included and engaged in planning and decision making. Parents felt very
well-supported, informed and involved by EPS. Foster carers had been helped by EPs
to care more effectively for children and young people by highly beneficial training in
attachment and trauma, and through consultation, advice and direct intervention. The
service had in place a range of helpful ways in which to seek the views of children,
young people and parents. The EPS recognised the need to develop further ways to
involve children, young people and parents in the development of services to meet their
needs.
The EPS was flexible and responsive to local needs and was very highly regarded. Its
exceptionally positive impact on the local community had been confirmed by
independent research and regular performance reporting. For example, it was very
skilful in meeting identified local priorities including those in Learning to Succeed in
Clackmannanshire, the education improvement objectives, the Council’s inclusion policy
and the joint health improvement plan. The EPS had made an outstanding contribution
to improving outcomes for children and families through its work with various local
networks and organisations. These included Tullibody Healthy Living Initiative and
Clackmannanshire Regeneration Partnership. The service made significant
contributions to local child protection and fostering and adoption services.
The EPS was characterised by a highly creative culture and adopted a range of
innovative approaches to delivering educational psychology. Its expertise and skill were
recognised nationally and internationally, for example in its approaches to attachment
and trauma and Thinking Through Philosophy. It routinely sought out and learned from
good practice elsewhere.
The EPS was friendly and supportive with a very positive ethos. Its staff felt well
supported and highly valued by the PEP and the authority. They were highly motivated
2
and confident in their professional skills. Regular supervision sessions and support
meetings were of the highest quality. Professional review and development systems
were in place to ensure that the training and development needs of staff were identified
and met. All staff worked very effectively in teams. Administration staff felt very highly
valued and were clear about their role and contribution to the work of the service.
4. How good is the service’s delivery of key processes?
The EPS delivered a broad and balanced range of services across consultation and
advice, assessment, intervention, training and research. Staff demonstrated significant
skill and knowledge and there was a wide range of appropriate consultation and
advisory services in place to effectively meet the needs of all stakeholders. The service
provided significant consultation and advice in relation to individual children and young
people as well as supporting a research and evidential base for developments. This
included Season’s for Growth and general approaches to early intervention. EPs
worked collaboratively to support assessment processes in schools in line with the
authority staged intervention model and to help build capacity in others. The service
had produced a helpful guide to educational psychology assessment for young people.
Creative approaches to support assessment were being developed with nursery and
special school staff. The service supported and delivered a wide range of very effective
and carefully planned interventions to address local and national priorities. These
included the management of critical events, dyslexia and post-school transitions. EPs
ensured that interventions involved parents, schools and others as appropriate.
The EPS had an extensive portfolio of effective training and development activities,
including training on early brain development, self-harm and the impact of prematurity.
Where appropriate, these were offered with partners in health and social work. Staff
had a very high level of skill in undertaking research and strategic development activity
to meet service and authority priorities in improving outcomes for children and young
people. Research projects and findings had been published in peer reviewed journals.
EPs regularly participated in national EPS conferences. The service was fair and
inclusive in all its practices. Evaluation data should be drawn together to inform
ongoing practice within the service.
3
Features of good practice:
EPS contribution to the delivery of Curriculum for Excellence within Clackmannanshire.
The EPS is contributing to the delivery of Curriculum for Excellence in a broad range of
ways in partnership with the local authority and other stakeholders. The approaches
include working with individual children, young people and families, systemic working in
schools and colleges, training of staff groups and supporting strategic developments at
an authority level.
•
Delivering an emotional wellbeing event for young people in S5 and S6 prior to
transition.
•
Promoting curricular approaches to developing the emotional competence of
children and young people across primary and secondary schools and the local
college.
•
Supporting effective assessment practices in secondary schools.
•
Providing support to parents to promote the development of resilience and
secure emotional attachments with their children.
•
Delivering focused support for young people around transition from school to
adulthood.
More detailed report is available at www.hmie.gov.uk.
4
5. How good is the service’s management?
The culture and ethos of the EPS was one where joint working was very well
established. The service worked purposefully and appropriately with others to improve
outcomes for vulnerable young people. The PEP worked very effectively with the head
of social work child care services to identify and prioritise work for young people at risk
of missing out. Staff in all services were clear and confident about their role and the
contribution of educational psychology. Clear information about the service was
included on the EPS website that could be accessed by partners. Partner agencies had
a consistently high level of satisfaction with the EPS and were very knowledgeable
about roles and remits. Other services valued the opportunity to work closely with the
EPS to improve the lives of vulnerable children and young people. A few partners
would have welcomed earlier engagement in developments.
There was a very good range of appropriate policies and procedures in place. These
linked well with GIRFEC, The Education (Additional Support for Learning) (Scotland)
Act 2004 (ASL) and the Council’s vision, value and aims. Very effective systems for
quality assurance were in place. Service users were active participants in the work of
the service, particularly in relation to the development of individual initiatives. The EPS
provided accurate and comprehensive information on services available to support
children and young people through regular communication and partnership working.
Community Early Assessment Team (CEAT) parent questionnaires and school
feedback had been sought over time and influenced service delivery. Interventions for
Recovery parent forms, peer support discussions, external agency structured
interviews, planning and review discussions with schools and feedback from children
and young people on specific interventions supported individual EPs to review practice
and improve services to stakeholders. Rigorous stakeholder feedback had been
gathered successfully to support funding applications in relation to Interventions for
Recovery.
Overall, collection and collation of stakeholder feedback information required to be more
systematic to aid self-evaluation, planning and reporting. In some cases, stakeholder
involvement requires to take place at an earlier stage of developments.
The service was engaged in effective joint planning with the community, partner
organisations and services. A range of priorities for improvement had been identified
through self-evaluation, discussion at service development days and as a result of close
partnership working at an authority level. Actions and target outcomes had been
detailed in the 2007–2010 improvement plan to support the delivery of education
priorities with clear links to integrated children’s service planning. Progress against
targets was recorded. Effective cycles of planning, evaluation and reporting were
clearly documented within Interventions for Recovery to successfully secure ongoing
funding. Planning within the EPS included sustainable development through awareness
of the need for succession planning and the building of capacity in others. The structure
of EPS planning requires to better reflect education authority and corporate plans and
timescales so that delivery of objectives and outcomes can be more easily tracked.
Targets identified in improvement plans require to be more impact focused and should
demonstrate the use of performance information to inform planning.
5
6. How good is leadership?
The PEP provided very strong leadership and direction for the service and
demonstrated a clear commitment to best value and continuous improvement.
Well-considered deployment of resources allowed the EPS to address the aims of the
authority very successfully. Channels of communication were highly effective both
within the staff team and with stakeholders. The EPS had a clear vision and, along with
the head of education and community services provided a consistent message to
stakeholders. The role and remit of the EPS was well understood by schools and
partner agencies. The service showed strong commitment to evidence based practice
and continuous improvement. The service was aware of the need for succession
planning. Opportunities for staff development, supervision and support to take forward
developments within the authority were in place. There was a strong consistency of
practice across the team and service users valued very highly the positive dimensions
added to the team by recently appointed staff. The service was risk aware and had put
in place solid structures to secure funding to manage sustainable development. It
consulted with service users when planning changes to the service it was offering.
Effective systems of staff review took place on a regular and planned basis to support
high levels of performance. There was a culture of self-evaluation across the service
and improvements to practice were routinely made as a result of feedback from service
users. A comprehensive quality assurance calendar was in place, with some elements
having been in place long-term.
The PEP set demanding but realistic performance targets and provided appropriate
support for staff at all levels. The delivery of high quality services and continuous
improvement had been maintained through a period of significant staff change within
EPS. There were strong links with quality improvement officers and service managers
within education and this had supported ongoing creativity within the EPS team. The
service enjoyed a very positive reputation.
6
Key strengths
The service had:
•
contributed to sustainable developments within the local community through very
strong partnership working;
•
earned the respect of the local community and beyond through delivering successful
outcomes for children and young people;
•
demonstrated the highest levels of professional insight into issues affecting children,
young people and families including highly effective therapeutic interventions and
resilience building; and
•
successfully promoted creative approaches to ensuring successful transitions for
vulnerable children and young people.
Main points for action
The service should:
•
ensure earlier and more systematic involvement of all stakeholders in service
developments to inform self-evaluation, reporting and improvement planning; and
•
modify the structure of its improvement plan to align with other planning structures
and include impact rather than process measures.
As a result of the very high performance, and the effective leadership of this service,
HM Inspectors will make no further reports in connection with this inspection. The
service and the education authority have been asked to prepare an action plan
indicating how they will address the main findings of the report.
Roslyn Redpath
HM Inspector
Directorate 5
October 2009
7
Appendix 1
Quality Indicator
Improvements in performance
Fulfilment of statutory duties
Impact on children and young people
Impact on parents, carers and families
Impact on staff
Impact on the local community
Impact on the wider community
Consultation and advice
Assessment
Intervention
Provision of professional development and
training for other groups including parents,
teachers and health professionals
Research and strategic development
Inclusion, equality and fairness
Policy development and review
Participation of stakeholders
Operational planning
Partnership working
Leadership and direction
Leadership of change and improvement
8
Evaluation
very good
very good
very good
very good
very good
excellent
very good
very good
very good
very good
very good
very good
very good
very good
good
good
very good
very good
very good
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