Ofsted Talks

 
On this podcast, we have Helen Davis, who's Head of National and Joint Inspection from HMI Probation, Lucy Hart, the Deputy Director and Multi-Agency Operations from CQC, Simon Alexander, the Associate Inspector from HMICFRS and Paul DInverno, Ofsted's HMI Specialist Advisor. We’re also joined by Sarah Jones and Tanya Fulcher from Norfolk County Council.
Cait Mellow  I'd like to welcome everybody to another episode of Ofsted Talks and this time we are talking about the JTAI, the Joint Targeted Area Inspection. This is a complex inspection where different agencies such as the Care Quality Commission, His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Probation, Ofsted, and His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary, Fire and Rescue all arrive in a local area at the same time and work together to inspect lots of different services that are supporting children. The Joint Targeted Area Inspections, JTAIs as we call them, we’ve been holding these for ten years. So do we all do all inspections that are done under this banner or is it sometimes us and CQC or HMICFRS. How does it work? Paul, do you want to talk us through that?
Paul DInverno  Yeah, so we've been undertaking joint target area inspections now for 10 years, so it's a good chance for reflection. In terms of, we do two types now. We do thematic inspections, which is Ofsted, of both children’s social care and education and HMI Probation, the Care Quality Commission and HMICFRS. So we all join together for the thematic inspections and they give a very unique insight into multi-agency working.And we also do an inspection of initial need and risk, sometimes known as the ‘front door’. And that's just CQC, HMICFRS and Ofsted to undertake those inspections.
Cait Mellow  So when you say the front door, what does that mean?
Paul DInverno  Well, we're looking at the initial response when need or risk is first identified for children. And we look at that through the window of individual agencies response. So some aspects of health, the police response and also children's Social Care and what is often referred to as the MASH multi-agency safeguarding hub where that exists and it's about the assessment of risk and need, the appropriate decision making and ultimately whether children and families get the right help at the right time.
Cait Mellow   Okay, so Simon, what do you think? Why do they work well? What are they adding in terms of value?
 
Simon Alexander  They work well because the whole process is looking across the whole system. So it's looking across how multi-agency responses. So as Paul said, you know, we are looking at how the police work together with children's Social Care, with probation, with health, and how those organisationscollaborate, to understand, assess and make decisions about their response for those children who are at risk and also their families.
Cait Mellow   Okay, so, so...from the CQC's point of view, what do you think, Lucy, about how important it is that we look at health and education and the sort of all the sort of different aspects of children's lives?
Lucy Harte  Yeah, thanks. There's no other there's no other inspection activity that looks at it, looks at it collectively and looks at it all together. So we consider how as a multi-agency partnership, those risks are identified and shared and understood.And we know from some of the complexities that we've seen through 10 years of delivering the JTAIs that that's critically important and adds significant value in terms of understanding elements like information sharing, assessment, ut also a cross-sector and multi-agency element of assessment because we know that these things don't happen in isolation. So the value of having the inspectorates work together and understand that together and be on site together, is significantly different and important.
Cait Mellow   And Helen, what do you think about it? Are you learning from each other in this process?
Helen DaviesWe absolutely are. So we inspect on our usual inspections, probation services, adult services and children's youth justice services. So for us, it's really important to work together with inspectorates who inspect children's services, who inspect health.Because the probation service, for example, cannot manage children's safeguarding and risks to the public alone. They need to be able to do that with the other agencies. So for us, they give a really clear, joined up pictureof what's really happening locally. And most importantly, they highlight issues quickly because we've got, for example, a HMI probation inspector on site at the same time as a HMI CFRS inspector looking at policing. And so if we find issues with information sharing, and we have had examples where we've been able to highlight
those issues right away and they've been put right within that week, which is very different to the experience when you go in as a lone inspectorate, just looking more narrowly.
Cait Mellow   So I'm getting a strong sense of collaboration and information sharing and working together over these JTAIs. It sounds really, I don't want to say Avengers assemble, but I kind of, that's what I think. Is that true?
Helen DaviesI think it's really powerful, to be honest, when we're all out there together. So absolutely, and it's that opportunity to raise issues quickly and have impact directly on practice there and then, but also in the longer term. So leaving people with action plans that require them to work together, for example, to improve systems. So it's getting it at both those levels that's a real benefit.
 
Cait Mellow   So we're not just saying, this looks great, this needs more work. We're sort of suggesting ways in which they can perhaps collaborate more or things that they need to highlight. Is that true?
Lucy Harte   Yeah, I think, thanks Cait. I think one of the powerful elements of, or the most powerful elements of the JTAI is the case tracking methodology as well that sits in the thematic JTAIs and the power that that has to bring not only the inspectorates together during the JTAI, but also bring together the inspectorates and the local area partnership. There's a real sense of everybody working together through that methodology because we, it's very difficult to challenge children, young people's and families' experiences of those multi-agency working and how people are collaborating and assessing and information sharing. I think that is a really significant and valued element of the JTAI and creates an element of a shared language, a shared understanding. There's a real time review of those experiences and how that's informing the partnership working across those partners that we've already highlighted and described. And I think that that's really key to the JTAIs and where we are now is as 10 years on, especially in thinking about some of the significant reforms that we're heading into as well. So yeah, I think that that case tracking element is critical.
Paul DInverno   Yeah, we've gone on from that, what Lucy just said. We've worked hard to ensure that as inspectorates, we have a very joined up approach to inspection and therefore we're able to have a multi-agency lens in terms of how we evaluatea local area and that really supports practice at a multi-agency level, as well as supporting improvements in strategic working at a multi-agency level as well. And as we know, no agency by itself can protect children. So it's that important message about how important it is for agencies and professionals to work together. And that gives you, as Lucy was saying, that holistic view of the child's experience as well, which is really important.
Simon Alexander   I think the other thing as well, just picking up on what Paul and Lucy said is, is we have the opportunity to speak to children and often their families as part of that case tracking. And that really brings to life and allows those people to have a voice as part of that inspection. I think that's really important to help the inspectors as well as the organisations that we're inspecting to understand what the reality is of their experiences and the outcomes of when agencies become involved to try and support and help them.
Cait Mellow   We're talking about reforms. I mean, are these publications used across government to inform, perhaps more broadly?
Paul DInverno   So what we do in quite a number of the themes is that we have a roundtable where we invite all the government departments and all the agencies so that we present our findings, the areas where there are strengths and improvements and the areas where further improvement is needed to influence government policy and practice and the practice of agencies as well. And so it's a collaborative approach to what we've learned and but importantly, what happens next in terms of taking that learning forward. And we've got probably quite a lot of examples about how we've influenced practice or multi-agency working positively at both a local and a national level.
Cait Mellow   Yeah, I was going to ask, do you come back after the JTAI report has been published in a period of time later to see if the, what the impact was?
Paul DInverno   I mean, one important part of the process is that after each joint targeted area inspection, the local partnership, the agencies come together to produce an action plan, a multi-agency action plan, that sets out how they're going to respond to the areas that we've identified that need improvement. And that is a really powerful vehicle in terms of driving improvement forward. And we've spoken to quite a lot of local partnerships about how JTAIs have helped them support their improvement journey. And we all do our individual inspections and we can see some of those improvements from JTAIs having happened through the lens of our individual agency inspections.
Helen Davies:   We found it really helpful to be able to use what we find in JTAI to then help inform the way we inspect even as well. So for example, on the JTAI, we do that case tracking, looking at cases as multi-agencies. We've now introduced thatto our youth justice service inspections, because youth justice services are multi-agency teams. So that's a direct example of something we've learned on JTAI now happening locally in over 100, it will be, youth justice services. And another great example is on our serious youth violence inspection, we added an element of looking at places and spaces. So recognising that the issues don't always happen in the home or they could be happening in, for example, a precinct. And we've introduced an element of that to our programmes as well, looking at places and spaces. So not only are we able to have the benefits while we're there, but we're able to pull them through to our inspection programmes and take the best of JTAI, what's worked really well and pinched it and we're using it.
Cait Mellow   That sounds brilliant. Brilliant.
Lucy Harte   Yeah, yeah, we've had the same experiences in CQC as well in terms of considering how we can use that methodology across some of our other work and particularly in thinking about some of the work that we delivered during COVID as well and how we use that case tracking for our provider collaboration reviews, and that was understanding particular themes. And there's, I think there's some clear value about how the case tracking can support the understanding of pathways and that interaction between different, different, either different services or different
points in a service for somebody who's accessing accessing either one service or many services together. There is there is a really clear value in in case tracking and what that what that brings to  the voice of people within an inspection process.
Cait Mellow   That's brilliant. So what's next for the JTAI?
Paul DInverno   Yeah, it might just be worth reflecting back about the process that we have. So every year we undertake a different theme and we look at six local areas in that theme and we write a national overview report, as we're saying, and trying to disseminate those findings.
Cait Mellow   What sort of, what sort of, what might be a theme?
Paul DInverno   So, building up to what happens next in the JTAI, our next theme is the multi-agency response to younger children living with neglect and how we arrive at these themes is that we engage with stakeholders and our principle is that we tryand evaluate a theme, an area of practice where we think that we can add the most value both locally to the local partnership and nationally in terms of supporting improvement. And that's how we arrived at that particular theme. But we've done lots of different themes where we've written overview reports to try andsupport improvements in practice. And obviously we will be amending our methodologies and framework to take account of reforms and changes that are happening throughout the multi-agency space that we work within, but specifically we will be looking at the Social Care reforms and Social Care reforms have a really strong focus on multi-agency working, which fits very well with the contribution that the JTAIs make.
Lucy Harte   I think as well, if I can add to it, that there is value, isn't there, in having had the JTAI model for 10 years now. We've seen some significant changes over those 10 years and we've had the opportunity to be able to revisit some of thosethemes. So in our thematic JTAIs, we've done 2 thematic J ties looking at the multi-agency partnership response to children who are victims of domestic abuse. And in that time, we've had significant legislative change in terms of how children are recognised as victims through the Domestic Abuse Act. So I think we've got examples and ways in which we can use the JTAIs in amongst a significantly kind of fluid and changing national landscape and potentially significant legislative changes.
how we can use the JTAIs and what that draws out from a multi-agency perspective to really reflect some of the impacts of the multi-agency practice.
 
Cait Mellow   It sounds like our work is a really powerful ally for children and families across the country, which is amazing. Anybody else want to say something they didn't get to say at this point?
 
Simon Alexander   Just one point I'd just like to raise is that over the 10 years, I think the process has really developed between the inspectorates and the inspected organisations. It's much more collaborative now. It is seen as an opportunity to learn and understand where you've got effective practice and where there are areas of development. And actually the process supports those organisations in having those discussions and developing. So the relationship has really matured over that 10 year period and is less seen as like being done to and inspected, which nobody really likes, but from a practitioner to a senior manager or executive point of view, it really is seen as an opportunity for a a sense check of where they are and reassurance, but also value in areas that need further discussions and development.
 
Lucy Harte   Yeah. I think as well there's another unintended consequence of JTAIs as well in terms of the inspectorates being together on site. So we've spoken about how some of the JTAI methodology has influenced some of our single agency methodology, but there's also an element of the inspectorates becoming familiar with each other's independent and single agency roles and the awareness of what happens beyond a JTAI, what what the what the inspectorates are seeing and hearing and findings through their single agency activity. And so understanding that shared role within within the kind of wider inspection footprint as well. I think there's a significantopportunity and benefit that we get from being together on site. So building on Simon's point as well about being together and understanding how each other work and how we kind of add value, yes, in the JTAI space, but those connexions outside of the outside of the JTAI as well, they're really valuable.
Helen Davies:   Absolutely agree. And just my final word, I suppose it's been great to be involved for these 10 years, but we've also been able to call on each other outside of the JTAI inspection. So for example, while doing a probation inspection, if we've got something we want to cheque out with policing colleagues at HMICFRS, then we can do that. And again, it can lead to immediate action. So it really does have benefits that extend that one week on site.
 
Fantastic. So thank you so much to Helen, Lucy, Simon and Paul. I'm now joined by a couple of colleagues from Norfolk County Council, Sarah Jones, Director of Safeguarding Partnerships and Opportunity, and Tanya Fulcher, Safeguarding Practice and Assurance. We're talking about the JTAI. What was your experience of that like? 
 
Sarah Jones
So from a Norfolk perspective, It was a really positive, rich experience, not just for the local authority, but for the partnership as well. On a number of levels, we've been on quite a significant improvement journey in Norfolk and when I first started there, a lot of the agencies in Norfolk were quite siloed in their approach. Everybody was looking down as opposed to out. And we made quite a shift as a partnership a number of years ago to start working more collaboratively, seeing children at the heart and the centre of what we do, coming together around a shared ambition. So actually a framework such as the JTAI really lent itself in Norfolk to how we like to work. The JTAI in particular, because there's quite a robust framework that sits behind something like a joint targeted area inspection, it really gave us the tools we needed to really assess what our individual practice was like for children and young people, particularly in the domestic abuse context. But it also then enabled us to look at what was our joined up and collective response in this space and what was our collective impact, but also what our collective improvements needed to be in this space. And I think it's true to say while a lot of work was happening across the partnership linked to domestic abuse and the fact that this particular JTAI was focused on children as victims and particularly children in that 0 to 7 space. It really, really made us think about our sort of collective practice and whether there was more that could be done. In Norfolk, I think we really model partnership working as senior leaders. So whether that's the constabulary, whether that's health, whether that's our education partners, the voluntary sector are very much a key partner around the table. I think we model that behaviour and that joined up working for our practitioners and staff. So this wasn't something new for Norfolk. This wasn't something that we were made to do. It didn't feel different and I think that really helped partners and particularly practitioners on the workforce. This wasn't something to be worried about. This was everyday practice that this was how we work. In terms of the way in which the JTAI is structured, it is hard work, you know, pulling together all of our multi-agency information, multi-agency audits, all the different policies and procedures that we collectively had. I wouldn't want to say it was an easy task for the partnership. 
 
Paul DInverno
It's still quite a challenging inspection to go through, but in some ways you were ready for it.
 
Sarah Jones
I think we were very much ready for a JTAI in Norfolk and actually because we'd got into the spirit of being a learning partnership very regularly every time a joint targeted area inspection theme would come about. So there'd been one just before on serious youth violence for example. I know this particular one was on domestic abuse. There's been others on neglect. Actually, we were able to use the framework as that sort of learning exercise and benchmarking for ourselves across the safeguarding partnership to really sort of test our individual and collective practice. And I think because of the relationships that we've invested in Norfolk with each other at a strategic level and operational level, it was a safe space to be vulnerable as well. So this is a really complex area. There are real children and families right at the end of it. Nothing is ever perfect sadly. So being able to have a space where we say actually, our collection of the voice of the child and our analysis, for example, may need to be better or the way in which we are sharing information at an earlier point needs to be more effective. That felt OK and safe to be able to be having those sort of honest conversations together. The honest reflection and in my experience of improvement, unless you're in that space where you can be vulnerable with each other as partners, as leaders, things do not improve and things do not get better for children. So one must be brave in order to make a difference. And I think in Norfolk during this particular experience, everybody was brave and willing to be vulnerable. 
 
Tanya Fulcher
Not only come, you know, highlight the really positive work, but actually to be able to say amongst ourselves, actually, this is really good, but we could be better at this, working in collaboration internally and externally. So even at that practitioner level, being able to highlight those areas of practice, both really positive, but actually also identify some of those areas that we'd like to strengthen. So all in all, it was a massively positive experience. 
 
Cait Mellow
And Tanya, who are some of those agencies that you were working with there? 
 
Tanya Fulcher
Across in the probation service, some of our health visiting teams, health in general, GPs, safeguarding. So there were many partners and relationships, some of which were already formed because obviously children's services form, you know, working relationships across all of the partners. But I think it really bonded and cemented some of those relationships. You know, they got to talk to people that maybe they hadn't before. I know there was examples of, you know, new health visitors that had come into post and we were able to form those relationships early on. So from that perspective, excellent, really good for practice. 
 
Sarah Jones
I guess for me in terms of improvements, really learning together about what improved identification and support for children at risk really looks like on a practice level. Another learning point I guess for us was around the need for greater access to specialist domestic abuse expertise. There was a lot of expertise across the system but I don't think necessarily all of our teams were accessing that in the right way. It was recognised during the JTAI that we had a robust workforce development approach across the partnership, but one of the things we learned was actually even though a lot of practitioners across the partnerships were being trained in terms of recognising domestic abuse interventions, what impact was that training actually having on their practice? And when we looked at that together as a partnership, we could see all this learning that had taken place, but we couldn't always see it in the case file when we were looking at what support had been given to the children. Not always were practitioners then taking what they'd learned enough for us to be able to see that in that direct practice. And I think another benefit for me was around a shared language. So depending on which agency you speak to, whether it be the police, you know, the local authority, health, just the way in which we understood domestic abuse and talking about that or the way in which each of us when we say risk, what do we actually mean by that? When we talk about cumulative harm actually from a police perspective to a children's services perspective, that could feel and look quite different. And even down to voices of the child, whether you were talking to a social worker, a health visitor or frontline police officer, voice of the child again meant different things. And for some it was just collecting the voice of the child in the there and there and then where as opposed to thinking about the voice of the child and analysing, you know, what impact could cumulative harm have meant for that individual child over a period of time. So that. It sounds simple, that shared language, but actually when you got into the depth of it about what each of those terms meant for us as different agencies, that was incredibly useful for our learning. 
 
Tanya Fulcher
And I would say that now, as a partnership, we're so much better at recognising, children as victims of domestic abuse in their own right. Their views are being captured. We can see direct work with children and understanding of that lived experience. The father-inclusive practice again is non-negotiable now for children's services in Norfolk, which means that all of our audit activity there, if it's a non-negotiable that we constantly revisit that to make sure that fathers are included in that and that goes obviously for perpetrators as well.
 
Sarah Jones
One of the things I often get on a soapbox about is the lack of join up nationally across government departments when it comes to children. So to have an inspection that includes the inspectorates that reflect a lot of the departments come together with a shared vision and a shared articulation of risk and true outcomes for children and come to work with us locally to talk about, ‘So what does this mean?’ Was incredibly valuable that that that in itself? I think there is a lot of learning nationally for how the the joint target area inspection actually works because the benefits are enormous. 
 
Tanya Fulcher
And there was some learning as well around, and I might be going off piste here, but sometimes practice was more variable, say for unborn babies and infants. So, working alongside our health visitor colleagues, for example, in health, hugely important to actually understand how. How do we capture the voice, for example, of children? How does that child remain central in that investigation or in that piece of work? And how do we actually gather that information from a non-verbal child? What do we need to capture? How do we work with our health colleagues? How do we come together on that to improve practice? 
 
Sarah Jones
The other bit I would add to that is as a partnership, we very regularly do multi-agency audits together. That's quite standard practice. But what the JTAI gave us was the framework to be more professionally curious in that space. I would say some of our previous multi-agency audits, particularly in the domestic abuse space, were quite light touch. They were quite broad where this really sort of made us think about children as victims, shared practice, cumulative harm, to be much more professionally curious then in our audit. We've been redoing those multi-agency audits every six months since, so it's given us a clear benchmark to assess our practice together. 
 
Paul DInverno
Part of the process is obviously at the end of the inspection when you've received our report and had time to reflect is to develop a multi-agency action plan. 
 
Sarah Jones
So we produced a composite improvement action plan, I think within, I think we actually started it during the JTAIs, we were picking up areas. But certainly in the weeks following, because it gives you some structure, it gives you some structure to come back to, it gives you something as a partnership to keep an eye on, monitor yourselves. Otherwise you get to the end of an inspection, you think, right, okay, that's done, what's next? And you can, it's quite easy to forget about the learning and forget about the things that need to be done. We also as a partnership in Norfolk had a leadership exchange event where the leaders who were part of the JTAI brought together our teams, our practitioners to share our reflections, our learning, what was next. Because we thought we had the privilege, I guess, as leaders to be able to hear that feedback direct from yourselves. Our practitioners across the system would only really be able to see the report. So we wanted that opportunity to share with them where we're really proud and recognise good practice, but also to be able to enforce the job is not done, it is never done. There are still improvements to make and this is what we're going to do. So and still now the composite action plan remains on the agenda every six months as part of our safeguarding partnership so that we don't take our eye off the ball in that space. 
 
Tanya Fulcher
Our learning has disseminated throughout every part of the service and across partnerships and in whatever professional meetings they're in regionally or nationally, that sharing is learned and is quite often part of an agenda to share the journey that we've been on and to share good practice. 
 
Sarah Jones
It just provides the perfect framework to make sure you are doing the right thing by children. 
 
Cait Mellow
Thank you so much to Sarah, Tanya and Paul. And I'd like to thank you very much for listening to our podcast and join us next time.

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Transcript: 
Tracey Metcalfe
My name is Tracey Metcalfe and I'm the Assistant Regional Director for Social Care and Regulation in the North East Yorkshire and Humber. We're consulting on reforms to our two main social care inspection frameworks, the Inspection of Local Authority Children's Services or ILACS for short, and the Social Care Inspection Framework, or SCIFF for short. So I'm here today with my colleagues, Dominic Stevens and Matthew Brazier. I'm going to ask colleagues to introduce themselves. Dominic.
Dominic Stevens
Hi. So I'm Dominic Stevens. I'm the programme lead for the ILACS Inspection Framework.
Matthew Brazier
Thanks, Tracy. Yeah, I'm Matthew Brazier and I do a similar job as Dominic, but I'm the programme director for the social care common inspection framework, which I'll explain a little bit more in a minute about what that means.
Tracey Metcalfe
Thanks so much, Matthew. Thanks both for joining me today. So we're consulting on reforms to our two main social care inspection frameworks. So could you both just briefly explain what these two inspection programmes are for and how they work for children? So I'm going to come to you first, Dominic.
Dominic Stevens
Thanks. So the ILACS framework, and as you've said, stands for Inspecting Local Authority Children's Services, is the framework we use when Ofsted acts as the inspectorate for all local authority children's services around the country. And we'll say a little bit more in a minute about what that means and how it might develop a little bit in the future.
Matthew Brazier
Social care common inspection framework, which is a bit of a mouthful, but that's a framework that looks at mainly regulated services. So things like children's homes, fostering services, residential family centres. And I think I probably should say a little bit about what regulated means. In other words, services that must meet certain standards of quality and safety that the organisations that provide these services have to register with Ofsted and follow certain guidelines and procedures.
Tracey Metcalfe
That's really helpful. And I wonder, Matthew, could we explore what's changing and why we're consultants? So, for example, can you tell me a little bit more about the vision for our revised frameworks in the SCIF, for example?
Matthew Brazier
We want our inspections to continue to act as a force for good. We want them to encourage the highest quality of practice and provision to ensure the best outcomes for children and their families. We've been working a lot with the government. We're ensuring that our frameworks reflect the reform agenda and to make sure that they align with changes to statutory guidance. We want to strengthen the way that ILACS and SCIFF talks to each other, to encourage providers and commissioners to work together, for example, to secure the right homes for children in the right places and ensure they meet the needs of all children, including especially those with complex lives. And to do this, we'll make the best use of our insights promptly and effectively, and we really need to reflect the shared responsibilities that local authorities and providers have for, after all, are the same children. And enduring relationships with the heart of inspection. And finally, and most importantly, we want to make sure we do all we can to hear the voices of children and their families, to help them participate in inspections. We really want to improve the way we feedback our findings to children and families. We've made some specific proposals in this consultation, but we also have set out an ambition for both the frameworks, what we want our inspections to do. One is that we want to make sure that there are different inspection frameworks talk to each other, that we make the best use of our evidence.
But perhaps most importantly, we want to make children's enduring relationships a central focus of both ILACS and SCIF. We want to make sure that children's connections and how that they're helped by services are really one of the most important questions that an inspector can ask. not just for children's relationships now, but also for their future as they approach adulthood. So that will be a real central part. Relationships have always been an important part of our inspection frameworks, but we want to make it front and centre.
Tracey Metcalfe
Yeah, so what you're talking about is putting children and young people and families right at the centre of our work across both frameworks.
Matthew Brazier
Another thing that we're we set out in the framework that we really want our inspections to encourage providers that are able to meet the needs of children with the most complex lives. We've been worried, not only us, I think everybody who works with children and families have been worried that some of the most vulnerable children are the most likely to experience instability. And we want to make sure that inspections really promote the work that helps those children. Because if we get it right, for the most disadvantaged the likelihood is that we'll get it right for all children.
Tracey Metcalfe
I just wonder if we could build on that and kind of briefly outline some of the key changes then we're proposing in the SCIF to do some of those things you're talking about.
Matthew Brazier
In the SCIF, not only do we want to make it clearer that we'll be taking a closer look at how relationships are promoted, we're proposing to have a separate outcome evaluation area on enduring relationships. So that's new. We're keeping the other evaluation areas that we have already. We're going to keep leadership and the impact on the impact of leaders. We're going to keep looking at making a judgment on the safety of children, but we want to add a new one on enduring relationships. That aligns with the government's ambition, and I think it aligns with the sector's view that this is the enduring relationship is so critical for children. So we hope that will be supported by the sector, but we're really interested in the views from everybody who answers the consultation about how we do that to make sure we're looking at the right things when we look at enduring relationships.
Tracey Metcalfe
Yeah, can I just take you, Matthew, for a moment to think about the focus on fostering? Because that is obviously something that we are going to be focusing on in the new framework. Can you tell us a little bit about that?
Matthew Brazier
We're proposing to add an evaluation area on support to foster carers for inspections of independent fostering agencies. Again, everybody listening to this podcast will know that there's a real challenge to recruit enough foster carers for children. And it's really important that local authorities are able to recruit the right number and agents and fostering agencies are able to recruit the right number with the right skills and experience and that they're properly supported and that they stay in fostering. So we're going to look closely about how well agencies recruit foster carers and how well they support them. We hope that one of the changes that we're proposing for SCIFF is how we link more closely to ILACS and how those two frameworks talk to each other.
Tracey Metcalfe
Well, that brings us really nicely on to Dominic, actually.
Dominic Stevens
I mean, I think, first of all, I want to echo everything that Matthew has just said. And it's important as we go forward that we really further strengthen the synergy between the two frameworks and how they work together, and indeed with Ofsted's other frameworks. I think I'd also want to start, if it doesn't seem a little bit back to front, with the things that aren't going to change. I think it's really important to say that whatever changes we aspire to make, at their heart, these frameworks are absolutely focused on whether or not children's needs are being met. how well they're being safeguarded, how well they're being helped to keep in touch with people who matter to them. And those things absolutely continue through. And the desire here really is to reflect developing practice, reflect the changes that the DFE are ushering in, you know, and to strengthen even further how we inspect and the extent to which they actually act as a driver and they provide learning for the sector to improve improved services for children, which is the bottom line. So in terms of the specific changes, the DFE are already consulting on changes that would enable Ofsted to look more closely at how local authorities support families at an earlier stage, and in particular targeted early help and how they support families to stay together.
We propose to amend our inspection frameworks so that they're much more focused on this, and we're able to target our inspection time on looking at those services at a much earlier stage of intervention for children and their families. We want to make sure that all the judgments really do three things and these echo some of the things that Matthew was just touching on. It's about looking at how effectively local authorities engage children, families and their carers in being central to decision decision making about their lives and indeed to shape the services they receive going forward. It's also about how they help those children to create and maintain enduring relationships with families, friends and professionals who are important to them. And finally, how effectively the local authority works with other agencies to meet children's and families needs. Because as we go forward with this, early help in particular is a real multi-agency area. Other changes that the government are bringing forward involve the creation of multi-agency child protection teams that are already being piloted in a number of areas. So it's important that our frameworks keep pace with and match those changes. We're also consulting on measures to tackle the use of illegal unregistered children's homes.
Finally, I suppose I'd just like to say that we're looking at the time scales between inspections, because it's important that we get the balance right between inspection, oversight and providing learning on services to local authorities, but also on giving those same local authorities the space and time to improve. So the inspection burden isn't too heavy on them. So it's about being proportionate and getting it right. And of course, that's going to be part of our consultation.
Tracey Metcalfe
Thank you, Dominic. And I know we're also exploring other changes that will affect both the frameworks. Matthew, I just wonder, could you tell me a bit more about the proposed five point scale and what impact we think this will have for children?
Matthew Brazier
The children, young people and families whose experiences we look at are obviously not just helped by children's social care, you know, they'll attend nurseries, schools and colleges. And we think it's more helpful for children, parents, the wider general public, if we use the same scale for all our inspections. It'll also help us to link our judgments more closely to government expectations. And hopefully it will make it much clearer whether a local authority or a provider is meeting or exceeding or surpassing these expectations.
Tracey Metcalfe
Thanks, Matthew. That's really helpful. And Dominic, we're also exploring how we can improve the way we report on our inspections. Could you tell me a bit about proposals for report cards, for example?
Dominic Stevens
Yeah, certainly. And it sort of links to the last point that Matthew was making as well. And it's about creating greater consistency across all of the areas that Ofsted inspects and regulates, you know, whether it's nurseries, whether it's schools, local authority children's services or children's homes. So it's easy for professionals and particularly for families, for children to be able to look at a more consistent product. And I mean, I think at the moment we publish our reports as documents on our website, which is fine, but, you know, we think we can do better. So we propose to move to, you know, online report cards. that provide an accessible summary of the grades we've given and a drop down section that then gives more of the detail and it will allow readers to go to the specific section of the report they want more more easily as well as indeed to read to read the whole as they would at the moment. The report card includes key facts and figures to help readers to understand the context of our findings. You know, and this may be about the demography, the makeup of the local authority, but also some of the key performance figures which, you know, the Department for Education, Ofsted, you know, the public at large are interested in. So naturally we'll be consulting on what are the right facts and figures, the right data to put in as part of our consultation.
Tracey Metcalfe
Thanks, Dominic. And talking about that consultation, who do we want to hear from as part of our consultation?
Dominic Stevens
Everybody is the short answer. I mean, naturally, we will want to hear from large organisations that represent the sectors we inspect and regulate, you know, whether that's local authority children's services, children's homes, residential special schools. We want to hear from all of the large charities or bodies that have an involvement in this. We want to hear from our own staff within Ofsted. Naturally, we'll be speaking to them too, from a social worker sitting at a desk who has a bright idea. But, you know, most importantly, we want to hear from children, young people and their families. You know, we expect local authorities to listen to children, young people and families and use that to shape their services. It's absolutely right that Ofsted does exactly the same when we embark on a significant change to how we inspect and regulate.
Tracey Metcalfe
Yeah. And Matthew, how important is it that we hear from as many people as Dominic's describing?
Matthew Brazier
Well, we want what we do not just be based on what Ofsted thinks. We want it to be based on what everybody across the sector, including children, young people and family think. We want it to be a consensus. We won't always get agreement with everybody, but it is a genuine consultation. We really do want to know. We haven't made decisions about these proposals. We have some ideas, but we're generally interested in what people have to say and, you know, we'll adapt what we do as we hear people's responses. It'll help shape our testing of what we do as well, because before we actually reach a decision, we'll try out some of these proposals in either as an inspection or just test some elements of the proposals to make sure they work. We really need to make, if we, whatever we do decide upon, we've got to make sure that it will work for children and families. So they will think really carefully, listen to everybody really carefully about what they're telling us to make sure that we come to the right decisions.
Tracey Metcalfe
Yeah, that's really important. And Matthew, what will we do with the responses that you're talking about? You know, how does what people tell us feed into policy and development?
Matthew Brazier
We'll know who's replying because we'll ask people on what basis they're replying. You know, are they child in care, for example? Are they replying on the basis from an organisation? So we understand some of the context. It'll help us to identify themes. And at the end of the day, we're going to have to make a decision about what to do. But we will reply properly. We'll set out a formal response to this. We'll publish a report in due course, saying what we've explaining, what we've heard, what we're going to do and why we're doing it. And not everybody will be agreeing with us with what we're suggesting, but we need to explain carefully about why we might not be doing certain things, but why we're going down this particular road.
Tracey Metcalfe
And I guess, Dominic, listening to what Matthew's saying, how are you going to weigh up the different suggestions and the stories of children, young people's families experiences? How are you going to weigh up those different suggestions?
Dominic Stevens
The way that we've structured the questions will enable us to group them into specific areas. So some of it might be not that we're weighing one particular suggestion against another suggestion, but we've got lots of suggestions from individuals and different bodies. And in many of them, there's a common theme, issue or suggestion emerging. Naturally, we'll want responses from, you know, large organisations that may represent many hundreds or thousands of people. They may come up with some really good suggestions or comments. But there might be that one social worker at a desk somewhere who comes up with a really great idea, or one child or parent who comes up with a really great idea. So actually ideas can be of equal merit wherever they come from.
Tracey Metcalfe
And those experiences are vital to help us shape our thinking and to get this right, make sure we get it right for children and young people and their families. Well can I thank you both very much for your contributions. I think the message is that we can only make a difference to children's lives if we all work together and it's really important the message today about everyone getting involved in that consultation. The consultation is now live. you have until the 28th of September to fill it in. Look on Gov.UK or search Ofsted Social Care Consultation. We'll consider every response. We will publish our response in early 2027 and the revised framework will be published in February 2027.

Did you know Ofsted inspects out of school care for children under the age of 8? This can include activity-based clubs, wraparound care and holiday activities. Find out more about how we inspect in this podcast with guests Craig Jones from the School-Aged Childcare Association and Dan Super from Super Team Sports. 
Cait Mellow: Hello everybody and welcome to another edition of Ofsted Talks. This time we're talking about school-age childcare. Did you know we inspect and regulate out-of-school care? I'm here with Wendy Ratcliff, HMI, the Principal Officer for Early Education at Ofsted. Caroline Hearn, the Specialist Advisor for Early Years at Ofsted. Craig Jones from School Age Child Care Association and Dan Super from Super Team Sports. What type of setting does this cover? After school, holiday clubs, wraparound sports? Caroline, talk us through that. 
 
Caroline Hearn: I absolutely can. But before I start, I just want to say we are recording this July 2026. So, we're heading into the summer holidays. And just I think Wendy and I and all at Ofsted would want to say a big thank you to all the wraparound providers who, unlike a lot of sectors who are winding down potentially in schools for the summer, we know the wraparound providers are gearing up to what is very hot summer it's turning out to be. So huge thanks for all the work they do to keep children safe, happy and well educated over the summer. I think that's just a huge importance for us to say that. And then of course I can answer the question. So after school clubs, it's funny, it really depends on the register you're on rather than the type of provision. So the way the Department of Education set up the legislation, you've got the early years register, which is for children from birth to the 31st of August after their 5th birthday. And then you've got the later years registers for 5 to 8 and then the voluntary for older children. So it really depends on the ages of the children that you want to be caring for. And often we find those that offer that the around holiday clubs, breakfast clubs, all of those, that type of care provision, do also register on the early years register because we've got those children who go into school who are before the 31st of August, before their 5th birthday. So they are captured in that age group. And then within that, there's all the different provider types that we have that I've just mentioned. So really, I want to now just ask Wendy, I'm just really interested, and Dan and Craig, just looking at what Ofsted does in our inspection work, how have you found inspections? I've talked about all that wide range of provision that gets inspected. So I'm going to hand over to Wendy and Dan and Craig to talk a bit more about that. 
Wendy Ratcliff: 
Shall I just talk a little bit about the changes we've made to how we inspect registered early years, if you're on the early years register as out of school providers, then maybe Dan and Craig, you can tell us a little bit about what you're finding?  
So if you are a provider that is registered on the early years register but only provide care exclusively to children at the beginning of or and end of the school day or during school holidays, you only need to meet the safeguarding and welfare requirements of the DFE's early years foundation stage. Therefore, our inspectors, when they come to do your inspection, they're not going to grade particular evaluation areas, curriculum and teaching or achievement, because you don't have to meet the learning and development requirements. And that's the same for before and after school settings and holiday provision with children younger than reception age. If you have one of these settings, you must have regard to, but you do not have to meet those learning and development requirements of the EYFS. Inspectors do evaluate though, your safeguarding and welfare arrangements. They will confirm that your setting meets the requirements of the early years register. And if your setting is also on the compulsory or voluntary part of the childcare register, inspectors will need to check it meets those requirements. So inspectors will do a range of things in, you know, gathering that first hand evidence and having those discussions. working with leaders, taking leaders on the journey and working collaboratively throughout that inspection through kind of like shared observations, using the early years toolkit. I could say more, but let's bring Craig down in. What are you finding in terms of our inspections? 
Craig Jones: 
First of all, thank you for the opportunity to speak and meet you guys as well. I guess we're finding that the scorecard, we're big fans of the scorecard and a lot of our providers are, it's something we've requested in relation to having an aspirational workforce. So they're not just looking at met or not met. And now we can have strong standards and if we can exceed them, amazing. So that's something obviously we couldn't get when outstanding good was changed to not met, which is fantastic. So I think that there's no doubt that that's something that we really want to strive for. And I think, again, it's sort of given the fire in providers’ bellies to really raise that quality as well. And I think the cycle of inspection, so clearly, we've obviously, everyone's got deadlines, we can see that. So there's quite a surge of activity to hit that three-year cycle, and we can see lots of inspections coming through at the end of the school term and during the school holiday periods as well, which clearly there's a lot of provisions that sort of register the same time. There's lots of providers start for the summer, so I can imagine Ofsted have got like a spike there. Our providers over our membership had over 100 inspections since November. So hopefully we can give a bit of feedback on that. But yeah, Dan, I think you've had one in Easter? 
Dan Super: 
We had two at Easter. So yeah, a quick little overview of who Super Sports are. So we only run holiday camps. That's what we do. It's been going nearly nine or 10 years now. Predominantly for years was mainly sports coaching camps. And then in the last two or three years, we've joined the early years register. We start taking children from age 3, as well as then the compulsory and voluntary registers. We run our camps every school holiday in independent schools. So in the kind of the private school facilities when those schools aren't running. Had previous knowledge. So last year had had a voluntary inspection at one of our locations, which was just more of a 45 minute, one hour inspection. Still wouldn't say very easy, but it was definitely easier than the full early years, which we had two this Easter, two weeks in a row back-to-back. And I enjoyed them, to be honest. It was, I was scared, I was nervous. It was, first time we'd been going nearly two years with early years, confident that we were, you know, that we're doing everything we needed to do. Had a lot of advice from, you know, SACA and other organisations that are there to support us. But you just always have that little worry of, until Ofsted are there, you know, to get to really, to really know. And it did, it went really well. We got strong across the board in all the areas. Both of the inspectors went through the toolkit on the day, the call the day before, then arranging a call in the afternoon, that was great. Felt like we knew the inspector before they arrived. Yeah, on the day, really supportive, definitely working together, felt supported all the way through and now confident and looking forward to another one. 
Wendy:  
And I just liked actually hearing you say about the planning call. That's actually something we are hearing across the sector, that the sector are welcoming it. And also, you know, thinking about that, notice and those telephone calls and the preparation in advance of actually being on site. And as you say, feeling like you've already built that professional relationship with the inspector. I think what's really important as well is something else she was saying there, it's saying about, we're confident we're doing what we're doing for our children is right. And I think that's a really key message for us, isn't it, Caroline, in terms of if you're doing what's right for your children, then you're doing what's right for Ofsted and you shouldn't be needing to do anything that isn't already set out in statutory or non-statutory guidance, which of course for early years is the early years foundation stage. And that's kind of like what the toolkit's based on. So we didn't want the toolkit to add extra workload to providers. 
Caroline: 
Yeah, it's a really interesting point you're raising there. And I'll just pick up on one thing you said there, Danny, that Les, you know, you were nervous. I think if you're vested in something and you really want to do well for children, which that's what the sector is there for, we want to do well for children, you're going to be invested in it, so you are going to have some nerves. So I think nerves are to be expected, but we need to work with you and help put you at your ease when we arrive and all the things that Wendy just about the planning call should all really help with that. You also talked about the difference in inspections though, it's really interesting. So the early years inspection, we're now moving to a four year window. So it was six, we're now every four. And then the later years, so if you're registered on the later years registers, that's a 10% sample. So you may or may not get an inspection. So you have, so you've had experience of both. But yeah, that's the difference between those registers and that's why that does just feel really different when you're out there having those different experiences because they are different by design. 
Craig: 
I think so. Certainly our sector is predominantly 5 plus. Now there will be school-aged childcares and the nature of it is that the children at full-time school and education. So therefore while there is 3 and four year olds, those 5, 6, 7, 8 plus are the core. 
Caroline: 
I mean, just have no doubt, we're always interested in all the children. It's just the legislation asks us to look at a certain age child. So it does seem like we're following around the four year old or not quite, you know, not quite 31st of all because after 5th birthday, five year old. But yeah, we're definitely interested in experiences for all children because that tells a lot about the setting and how relaxed children are and how much they're enjoying their experience and how confident they are. You still see all of that? 
Wendy: 
And thinking about that safeguarding culture. for example, that the safeguarding culture across the piece, of course, isn't it? And Dan, I know you touched on the call. I think the call is helpful. There's no doubt about it. And even just talking about the setting and getting the inspector's knowledge about even logistics around where do we park and where do we meet and so on, all those things that can sometimes take time before. And it feels like straight away the inspection is more around the children versus paperwork and policy, when obviously that's all important as well, but it feels like there's that, the duty of care requirement, feels like it's more focused on that than maybe, you know, a long time ago, maybe inspections were geared towards around paperwork, which again is still asked and deep dive in on those questions, but I think I like the idea of when the inspectors are in, they actually follow a trail and they'll follow a thread of something. So this team member, can we look at their recruitment? How did they start? What their process? Can we now speak to them? What training do they have? So it feels like it's end to end as well versus maybe before, maybe some providers have brought in their best people to go through an inspection. And now it feels like the inspection process is a lot more robust to to make sure that that's a, I guess, a measured outlook as well. 
So following through those areas of inspection focus and, at the end of the day, what we want to do is we want to find out what it's like to be a child at this holiday play scheme. We want to find out what it's like to be a child at this breakfast club, this out of school, you know, provision. That's really important. And what it's like, typically like, not just on the day of inspection. 
Caroline: 
We've had some questions around, qualifications. And we're well aware that when it's school age childcare, not specifically three-year olds, that qualification is sort of deemed by the provider and the provider can choose what qualification, obviously mandatory safeguarding and whether they're providing food and so on, food hygiene, but that and paediatric first aid, but that feels like it's sometimes can be ambiguous. I know it's something that school-aged childcare association really pushing forward in relation to what kind of qualification framework or standard should there be for school-aged childcare, which again is not linked to the inspection. It's just trying to raise that quality as well. But Dan, you've got a lot of range of qualifications, don't you, from teachers and nursery team members to sports coaches and so on. 
Dan: 
Yeah, there's all of the younger coaches that are doing sports kind of leadership courses at school. We run our own ones of those now to give some key leadership. And then we touch on safeguarding in those, even for age 16 plus, just starting to teach them all about that. And then there's all the different national governing bodies for each of the sports that have their level ones, twos and threes. And obviously those sports coaching qualifications I don't think mean very much to Ofsted. It's more, that's more learning how to coach the sport. Those courses usually come with safeguarding qualifications. They have to get through the governing body. 
Caroline: 
We do recognise the qualifications. Anybody who's taken the time to go and get a qualification want to up their skill set, that's no bad thing. We're always really keen to see that. What we don't have is any specific qualifications because you've got EYFS. is there. Yes, we do recognise qualifications and you can see when a staff member is skilled and had some training, it's really good and really important. But I think that's one for the department to look at and look at the underpinning legislation and to help. with that, because I think, the sector are asking for that kind of to be a little bit more navigable, so to speak. Just looking at the sector and what's going on in the sector at the moment, people might find it interesting to know how there's been lots of government initiatives, lots of change at the moment. What's it like out there in the sector at the moment? How is it looking? Obviously, we see what we see through inspection, but you see what you see through the kind of sector growth. 
Craig: 
It's quite good actually. So you've got, I'll maybe talk from a maintain school background and then Dan from an independent. So maintained schools, we're definitely seeing more children with SEND challenges. I guess a range of whether children have got EHCP plans or not and how we can be, how can we make reasonable adjustments versus unreasonable adjustments. That's quite a grey area for providers. I think that's quite an area whereby we definitely need more upskilling and I know that lots of providers have various partnerships to help their team members. Cost of living has been challenging, no doubt about it, and the price of childcare is rising and that sort of goes in line with the national minimum wage increases and so on. So to make that sustainable and really make sure it's constantly striving to develop people. The challenge is making sure that the best people stay in the sector, I think. And certainly within wraparound childcare and school age childcare, you know, that split shift scenario of a breakfast club and an after school and then a holiday, right? How can we make that a real role that people feel? And it's great that we've got those different roles for people and backgrounds and all those people that do work in the sector. but I do feel that maybe that progression and that I think the qualification and the standard in the future could help that as well. So staff retention is a challenge, no doubt about it, but I see innovation from providers and how they develop and retain their people, whether that's engagement pieces throughout the term time, whether that's being full-time contracts versus just holiday or just term time, and then also providing that real flexibility. Some of our team members in the sector don't necessarily want to work Monday to Friday anymore. So having that option of working some of the peak days and we see Friday as a real quieter day within wraparound childcare in the term time certainly and sometimes in the holidays as well with that sort of remote working and difference in behaviour there I guess. All in all the sector is super resilient. The National Wraparound Fund has seen lots of new spaces grow and create new clubs. I am worried about the sustainability within school age childcare session, there's over 100 schools that will be closing because they're not sustainable and that have previously had funding. So there seems to be, we could have some kind of solution after that in regard to a parent subsidy and so on. Great news around the holiday activity food fund and the continuation then, but I know local authorities can flex that up, but that can create challenges for providers. But All in all, those challenges aside, the sector is still continuing to grow. I do think it's professionalizing more as well and seeing, and I'm going back to that scorecard scenario, that's got lots to do with it. The sector's now aspiring and I think, you know, the first provider that gets that exceptional will be a real coup because I think it's, I actually do think it's quite difficult for out of school because you're only seeing a snapshot of maybe one hour, 3 hours. whereas a nurse where you can see the children in their learning environment as well. But needless to say, I think, and Dan, you might be the first, aren't you? So maybe from an independent school background, you'd want to give an outcome there. No pressure, mate! 
Dan: 
Yeah, I hope so. No, we should have one, another one due this summer, I think. So, yeah. In terms of the independent school sector, that all of the, our camps are open to children from all backgrounds. With regards to children, everything Craig said, again, we're noticing exactly the same. And then with the recruitment and coaches challenges, again, all the same. I guess the only difference that we're noticing independent school wise is the addition of VAT onto school fees. So there are some independent schools closing. I guess then we are then seen more as a marketing tool for the independent school that we work at, that then we work with the marketing admissions team to help, in local community engagement of that school into the, for the, area coming in to attract children to the school. 
Wendy: 
Is there anything around registration timelines, Caroline, that you wanted to follow up? 
Caroline: 
Yeah, I mean, people's registration is, we're doing a lot this summer. We're going to take down all our existing registration guidance and reissue just to make a lot more clarity. I think it still comes back to, it does take a window that it takes because it, and it's an average of 12 weeks because we've got a lot of checks to do on individuals. We're really mindful though that we've got individuals out there who've got buildings and probably staff starting to set up and they want to get parents and it's that sequencing and how you can sequence to make sure that the things align so that your registration is really at the point where you're starting to want to pay for those buildings and pay for those structures and got to make sure it's safe for children and it's right for children. And then we've got to make sure that we're keeping as much communication with you as we can. We've introduced welcome calls into our registration processes to kind of have that chat with people to walk through. And of course, I mean, you guys will probably be looking at more of expansion of existing, so an approval visit when you're wanting to add on a new provision because that's possible. That's a bit quick because we already know you and know a little bit about you. Is there anything sort of you think we could be doing different in the registration space? 
Wendy: 
Caroline, we're seeing a lot of the sectors sort of consolidate. So some of the smaller providers are starting to work with the larger providers. And I think to Dan's point within the independent school sector, you can feel how that might happen as well to help them one survive, but also continue to grow and give opportunity to more employees and more children. And I think then that can be challenging because there's a point where a provision might be closing and a provider wants to take it on to keep consistency of service. And then that feels like even when the staff are TUPE-ing across and it's the same team members versus the same employer, that feels like maybe, because at the end of the day, we don't want it to impact the families that need that consistent care. So there's, I think there's a piece there that maybe, school-aged child care can help Ofsted in understanding some of the challenges there as well. 
Caroline: 
That's really interesting. So helpfully, the Secretary of State announced earlier in the year that she is now looking at, and she's commissioned the department to look at multiple provisions. So exactly what you're saying, where you're trying to bring in new provision and you're growing your business, but maybe get it all under one registration and what that looks like. So they're looking at the legislation around that. And I know there'll be after groups like yourselves to come in and talk about that with them and talk about experiences of that. And that work has already started. Can't talk too much more about that at the moment, but just kind of it's there, it's been announced, it's been it's being looked at. So you are being heard in that space. 
Craig: 
I think that's positive, Dan, from my point of view, certainly for the members in relation to them often having to speak to one person and the restrictions that one person has when that one person might be associated with 50 to 60 settings. It feels quite prohibitive and I know we can have other people attached to them, but that sort of one person scenario. It doesn't feel like the business owner, Dan, I know you're under pressure with that. You know, you would never go on holiday when the provision's on at the moment. Whereas obviously a provider that runs 52 weeks of the year is going to need that time as well. So yeah, it feels like there's something more there as well that could maybe the infrastructure of a medium sized organisation and how many people are known to Ofsted? 
Caroline: 
Definitely, hearing that kind of one point of contact is tricky when you've got a lot of provision that you are the one point of contact for. So yes, there's definitely something to come back on that on. I was just looking, we talked a bit about inspection and how that's going. And I just wondered, just to ask Wendy a bit more about the toolkit and how providers can use the toolkit, because there's some sort of changes in that within our ways of inspecting that might be interesting to explore. 
Wendy: 
Yeah, absolutely. That's a really good question and something that we would encourage settings providers to be using the toolkit in between inspection as well, because it's something that we feel can be used as a self-improvement tool. We want to be open and transparent with, what it is that we look at when we're on inspection. There's some really useful evidence gathering prompts in there in terms of what our inspectors will look at, you know, in terms of, as you say, following through one of those areas of inspection focus you talked about earlier, Craig, that kind of thing. And just that kind of reassurance that, you know, we don't want the toolkit to add to settings workload, anything, you know, there shouldn't be anything in the toolkit that a setting's not already expected to do by other, you know, statutory guidance, non-statutory guidance. And very much, using it as a tool in between inspection, as that kind of like self-improvement tool. Our inspectors will work with settings and leaders and go, use it as a way of celebrating what a setting is doing well, validating leaders, what leaders are working on and their priorities. for the future. And also then there's that opportunity to highlight where improvement is still needed. And then there's then, then there's the standards as well in terms of how they're set out. And that's set out of, across that five point grading scale. There's, and we've got needs attention expected, strong standard. They're all on one page and they're on one page for a reason because they're the grades we expect to see most often. And every inspection will start with expected standard because that's what we should expect for all our children. 
Dan: 
On the planning call, one of the things the inspector was asking us is where we thought that we are on the on in terms of the grading on the toolkit. and first inspection we went modestly with expected and then that was the starting point in the actual inspection. The inspector went through that column and on each of the different areas, all the different points and then we ended up with strong. So she moved us up from where we thought we were. And then the next week for the next one, we kind of knew where we were. So we went with strong and that was the column again that she was then grading us on. And it was, it was, it was, that was a big consistency. There were slight, slight differences as well between the inspections, but that was a, that was a really good thing. Then we, yeah, enjoyed that. I found the framework over the last few years more difficult to read. That toolkit now, I think, is we've all been through it lots recently, and it's a lot easier to read. 
Wendy: 
That's good to hear. Thanks for sharing that, Dan. And I think as well, the other thing to say with the toolkit, and hopefully that comes through as well, is that there is, it does talk about how the toolkit works for different provider types. So it will say, for out of school providers, curriculum and teaching, for example, that doesn't apply. You use the word consistency there because that's something from our chief inspector, Sir Martyn Oliver's big listen he did not long after he was first in post. And consistency was something that was coming through. And that is one of the things that we've said we need to make sure that there's a consistent approach to how we use our inspection methodology whilst taking into account the context in which providers are working in because no... It's a bit like we say, no two child minders are the same. So no two inspections are going to be the same. No two types of holiday place scheme are the same. They might be operating under the same kind of like umbrella and policies and procedures, but they're in a different building to the one, you know, it's a different, no 2 inspections are ever going to be the same. But the application of how we apply our inspection approach, there should be consistency there. So that's good to hear. Okay, so just before we finish, I think it's good to finish off where Caroline, you started by giving thanks to the sector for all that they do. They're providing for children before school, after school, during school holidays. We've got a busy summer coming up. So yeah, just to say thank you and you carry on doing what you're doing. And if you are doing inspection, then just remember that, if you're doing what's right for your children, then you're doing what's right for Ofsted. 
Cait:  
So, thank you so much to Craig, Caroline, Wendy and Dan and join us next time on the Ofsted Talks podcast 

We spoke to Dan Tingle from the National Grid about how he found the recent inspection under the renewed framework, Joel Dalhouse the lead inspector, and Denise Olander, Ofsted's Deputy Director of post-16 education, training and skills.
 
Cait Mellow
Hello everybody, and welcome to another episode of Ofsted Talks, the Ofsted podcast. I'm hosting the podcast this time. My name is Cait Mellow and I'm the Head of Engagement at Ofsted. I'm here today with Denise Olander, who is Ofsted's Deputy Director for FE, Dan Tingle, who's the Head of Development Programmes at the National Grid and Joel Dalhouse, His Majesty's Inspector from the West Midlands FE team. As we've recorded this, we've published reports for about 150 inspections so far under the renewed inspection framework, but let's focus on one in particular. We inspected the National Grid recently. So, Joel, you were the lead inspector. What sort of things did we look at?
Joel Dalhouse
So, we looked at apprenticeships and we were looking at, especially from a distribution point of view. It's something that there isn't much of in the country, electrical distribution, the apprenticeships organisations that offer that. So, we had a look at that.
Cait Mellow
Okay, so what sort of things do you look at when you're looking at an apprenticeship inspection? Do you talk to apprentices?
Joel Dalhouse
Yes, that's quite an important part of our activities, is really trying to understand their experiences. We try to get underneath whether they are developing that knowledge, those skills and those behaviours that would help them to be very successful in the career that they've chosen.
Cait Mellow
Dan, what did you notice? What sort of experience was it?
Dan Tingle
It was interesting really because we were inspected against the old framework for another part of our business in July and then inspected in December on the new toolkit. I think that the new toolkit has similarities to the old framework, but there's a much bigger focus on making sure that we're supporting learners that have barriers to learning.
Cait Mellow
So inclusion is a big part of the new framework. How does that look on inspection?
Dan Tingle
It's a challenge. It's a challenge because it's first to understand what you mean by inclusion, what you mean by barriers to learning. I think the first thing is for organisations and providers to consider that and what comes into the scope of that. One of the things that we found is having really good data to be able to identify those learners. And then you can really dig into what that means and what supports available at each opportunity.
Cait Mellow
Denise, what do you think a look into inclusion on an FE inspection?
Denise Olander
So I think Dan's right, we've always looked at those with SEND and those who have particular barriers to learning. So that was very much a focus under the education inspection framework. But under the renewed framework, we now have inclusion as a whole evaluation area, which we've never had before. So we are, we're grading inclusion as a whole new evaluation area. And within that, it covers a wide range of learners and apprentices. So the toolkit is what we use to identify the criteria and the standards in which we judge the provider against. So we collect evidence against the criteria in the toolkit. And once we've collected that evidence, We then use the picture that we formed through evidence collection against the criteria in our handbook. So we hope that most providers will be at least at the expected standard. It's a really high bar. It's providers doing exactly what we would expect them to do using taxpayers money. and making sure that learners, and in this case apprentices, are receiving high quality education and training. In the inclusion evaluation area, we identify learners with SEND, those who are vulnerable. Quite often that's because of the financial situation that they find themselves in. Maybe they're from low-income families. And then there's a wide range of other factors which could mean that an apprentice or a learner have some barriers to learning, things such as known to social justice, known or previously known to social services, mental health issues.
Cait Mellow
Help me understand this, Dan. So the National Grid are an employer and a provider. How does that work?
Dan Tingle
It’s a challenge. At the National Grid, we offer apprenticeships in a range of areas. It may be some really technical, bespoke niche skills that we have into deliver what we do as an organisation, or it may be some of the more support function type roles that we have in the organisation, maybe like a finance role. We will use training providers where they have the expertise, but in areas where we are the experts, and typically that's in sort of high voltage electricity, then we will be the training provider for those programs. And it's a really good model that we've got in place now. So for our transmission business that we have, when we were inspecting in July, outstanding result that we got in that inspection was 20 years of outstanding.
Cait Mellow
Wow. So do you find that people who you have as apprentices, do they stick around? Is the National Grid one of those places where people just work there forever?
Dan Tingle
Yeah, so I'm in my 27th year. I started as an apprentice at National Grid. And it's always nice that when we introduce ourselves in meetings internally, I'm never the most experienced in the room. And so, yeah, so people do stay here for a long time. It's nice, I've been at National Bridge Training Centre for 20 years now. The people that I've seen in senior roles in the organisation that started as an apprentice as well, it's really positive to see those people.
Cait Mellow
Did you get a chance, Joel, to talk to people like that on an inspection?
Joel Dalhouse
Daniel and myself had a number of conversations about the apprenticeship, how it's been designed, the rationale behind why they offer the apprenticeships they offer, why they feel they're the best place to offer those apprenticeships, what they're hoping that their apprentices get from that. And we also speak to people that the apprentices work with in the work environment just to see and get an understanding of those skills that they're developing and how they really compare to what would be expected and to see if they are really benefiting in that business. So it's really important to speak to people within the organisation just to get that sense of those skills developed.
Cait Mellow
So I'm getting the feeling that it's not just, oh, we'd better have an apprentice just to sort of tick a box. You're genuinely committing to really seeing that these people or, you know, the young people in your schemes are sort of progressing, they know what's happening, they know where they're going, they're aiming for something that's concrete.
Dan Tingle
Apprenticeships are embedded right from our strategic workforce planning processes that we have in place. We know one, 3, 5, 10 years out what sort of workforce numbers that we're going to require as an organisation. And apprentices are at the heart of that to make sure that we've got the right level of individual joining the organisation. And linking back to the previous question about do people stay at National Grid? The answer is yes. And one of the reasons is that people know there are opportunities to develop. that may be in the original field that they were recruited against. So I joined as a transmission substation apprentice. There would have been opportunities to progress in that field of expertise. And I chose to move into a training centre and I've been fortunate to move into the roles I've got. And again, Joel's answer about talking to people that have been apprentices, again, it's really easy for us to be able to put senior leaders in front of an inspector during an inspection. And it's just nice that a lot of them were apprentices and they can talk about their experience and why they're still there. And that in itself showcases that people do develop a national grid.
Cait Mellow
Yeah, I can see how reassuring that would be if you're a young person who's just starting out. Somebody who, you know, was where you are now a long time ago is now got all sorts of opportunities, which is great.
Denise Olander
The difference between the original education inspection framework and the renewed inspection framework. The key difference is the introduction of the inclusion evaluation area. And when we were thinking about the design of the new toolkit and the methodology, the inspection methodology that sits behind that, we had a very clear vision about inclusion. because that inclusion evaluation area helps us to continue to put learners and apprentices first, because that's what we've always tried to do through our inspection work. But it's really shone a light on the work that providers do. And it's helping us to break down even further the barriers that some learners and apprentices experience. And by breaking down those barriers, we are raising the standards. And it's particularly for the disadvantaged and vulnerable because we want to enable them to thrive in their studies. And our focus on those as part of this renewed framework is really, we're already seeing that that's really helping them to do so. we look at how the provider identifies needs, provides timely support and reduces barriers to learning. What we're finding is the nature of inclusion lends itself really well to further education and skills providers because we can already see some of the great, innovative, dynamic work that providers do and have always done on behalf of their apprentices so that they get that access to the education, training and teaching that they need. We're hearing that they're feeling valued and that they belong and that links very nicely to what Dan was saying about people. people staying within the organisation because they do feel valued and they do feel like they belong. And then as a result of that, we're finding that they then thrive in their learning. And really importantly, they achieve the apprenticeship and the qualifications that sit beneath that, at least in line with their peers. So in some of the very best providers, where the support is so effective, they actually achieve at a higher rate, the standard of work is higher, they progress through that apprenticeship at a much faster pace. So it's our opportunity really in furthering education skills to celebrate the great work that we knew all along, didn't we Joel, that our providers were doing on behalf of their learners and apprentices, whether they're 16 to 18 or whether they're studying an apprenticeship as an adult. and we see people studying apprenticeships well into their 30s, 40s, et cetera. So the most important thing for us is that the provider has that opportunity to show us and for us then to celebrate and validate the great work that they're doing. And we, as I mentioned previously, we focused on learners who had SEND or maybe were in receipt of high needs funding. And what we mean by that is that their SEN needs are so significant that they get additional funding to help them to study. And we've always focused on those. But under this framework, we've broadened our focus. So we always say to a provider, you tell us who are your apprentices or learners who are vulnerable or disadvantaged. Who are they for you? Because they will often vary according to the provider. But to try and be helpful in our toolkit, we've listed a range of learners who may find themselves with barriers to learning. So those who are socio-economically disadvantaged, they may have previously been on free school meals in the past six years, or they may be from low-income families. I mentioned those with SEND and those who receive high needs funding, or any other additional support to help them with their learning. They may have an education health and care plan, those who are known or previously known to social care, including those who are under the age of 18 in care and care leavers, those who are known to the youth justice service, and then those who have other barriers to learning and or their wellbeing. So they may have previously been not in education, employment and training, or they could be people who do not currently have a level 2 in English and or mathematics. So that's our starting point. of identification of those learners who may be vulnerable or disadvantaged. But we always say to Dan as the nominee, you tell us who those people are. And then when Dan will tell us who those people are, where they're studying, when they're studying, and then Joel as the lead inspector will use that information to do what we call a case sampling exercise. So we make sure that when we talk to learners, look at learners work, look at apprentices in the workplace. We make sure that the learners that Dan and the apprentices that Dan told us about are within the cohort that we look at so that we can make a comparison between those who the provider or Dan has identified as needing support compared to those who don't. And that's when we can make that comparison about the progress they make in their learning, the knowledge that they gain over time, their skills development, the standard of their work, how they contribute to the workplace. So we're constantly using that information to find out from them and their employer or their manager or workplace coach how well they're progressing against those who are not identified by the provider. And we do that really carefully because some people may find themselves from one of those categories I mentioned, but not need support. So it's really important that we aren't labelling those people. We use the information to begin the conversation with Dan. Dan will then say, these are the people that we're providing additional support to. This is what it looks like. This is how we assess them. This is how we're monitoring how effective that support is. And then we, or Joel, sorry, as the lead inspector, will make sure that we include them in our sample of people that we talk to, because we never get a chance to speak to every apprentice or every learner. So it's very much a sampling people, but using the information that Dan gives us to make sure that those people are within the sample that we choose.
Cait Mellow
So it sounds to me, Joel and Dan, like it's a sort of, it's not being done to you, this inspection, it's being done with you. Would you agree with that?
Joel Dalhouse
Well, I would hope Dan would agree, yeah. Yes, but I would say so. I think it's definitely working together. Right from the planning call, we sit down and we discuss the learners that are identified as those who have barriers to their learning. We then have a look at those within the apprenticeships in this case and then select a few which would give that sample of how that's working within the provider. So I'm not sure how Dan feels about it.
Dan Tingle
Yeah, 100%. From that planning call, the first planning call, the inspection is working together. So myself and Joel worked really closely together. And I spoke to Joel on a number of occasions about us wanting to showcase what we wanted to showcase as a provider. And that relationship is key to be able to do that.
Cait Mellow
Currently, the sort of the economic outlook for young people is tricky. Why do we think that an apprenticeship or training, in-house training with an organisation is a good option?
Denise Olander
When we talk to apprentices, whether it be with the provider that they're studying with or in the workplace, many of them prefer that style of learning. So it's around about 80%, what we call on the job at work, where you're learning at work and you're working and being paid. And then it's around 20% of their time where they come off the job at work and have dedicated study, training, skills development time. And for many, not just young people, but for many apprentices, they really like that approach where they are working, studying, learning in the workplace, receiving really great coaching, and they get the opportunity to achieve a qualification to whatever level they're working at. but they're doing it through the workplace with some studying and training when they're not at work, or maybe they're at work, but they're in a training centre. So it's an increasingly popular way of learning and achieving qualifications. We know it's a key priority for the government, but most importantly, it's a way of learning and working that suits the individual. They like the structure that the workplace gives them. They like the support and the coaching and the development and what is quite often a secure job at the end of it. Now in Dan's case, these people are already employees, Dan, aren't they? But for many of the apprentices that we meet, it may not necessarily be a secure job that they're in at the moment, but they're hoping that it will lead to that or it may lead to a secure job with another employer.
Cait Mellow
And I guess it's also a supportive kind of place to be with lots of other people who are in the same situation as you with a chance to make some friends and support each other.
Dan Tingle
Yeah, definitely. I know when I started my apprenticeship a long time ago, that I still know every individual that was on that programme, still got relationships with some of them that were on that programme. And that's typical for any sort of cohort of apprentice that is probably around in the UK, not just National Grid. But like Denise said, said, the practicalities of doing an apprenticeship, learning on the job is really good. Getting the experience that you need to do that first post role is really good. And getting the benefits of an employee whilst they're on programme. I know from personal experience at National Grid provides so many benefits.
Cait Mellow
I want to have a little plug for if you're a parent or a young person who's looking for an apprenticeship, please do have a look at our reports on the local offers in your area because they're really good, they're not just for the people who are at the college or the setting, they're for parents and young people to have a look at and to make sure that apprenticeship is going to be right for you or your child. There's lots and lots of information in our new style reports and they allow you to focus on something which might be really important to you.
Dan Tingle
Quick sort of appreciation for the work the inspectors are doing at the moment. It feels like the inspectors really do care about your well-being. Not that it feels like, inspectors really do care about the well-being of the staff that have been inspected. The nominee probably in particular, but it was evident that those past two inspections we've had, it really is clear that people do care. If I've just got time for one quick anecdote. For the inspection that we had in July, when I had the planning call, I'll not name the lead inspector, but she asked me if there were any reasons why we couldn't be inspected. And I made a joke and said, does Oasis count? because I'd got a ticket to Oasis that week. And we kind of had a little joke about it. And then when we got into the inspection itself, the senior HMI came along for one day and said, oh, so you're the one that is supposed to be going to Oasis. I said, yeah, I've forgotten about it now. It's gone. I'm quite happy to miss it. And she said, absolutely not. In no circumstances are you missing that. We'll finish everything up early today. We brought forward the final meeting of the day. And that happened because people cared about my wellbeing that it was a big thing for me to miss. So yeah, no, I just wanted to say thank you.
Cait Mellow
All that remains for me to do is say thank you very much to Joel, Denise and Dan. And don't forget to have a look at our reports if you're looking for an apprenticeship. They're really helpful. Join us again soon on Ofsted Talks.
 

Want to know more about Ofsted's renewed education inspections? In this episode, Lee Owston (National Director, Education), Lee Elliott (Assistant Regional Director, North East, Yorkshire and Humber), Jayne Coward (Deputy Director, Early Years) and Andrea Dill-Russell (Senior HMI, Further Education and Skills) explore the key changes to education inspections and what Ofsted is hearing on the ground from our pilots and inspections now they have started. 
 
Transcript
Jonathan Bennett: Hello and welcome to another episode of Ofsted Talks, the Ofsted podcast. And today we're going to be talking about our renewed framework for inspection. Inspections started in November, and we're going to explore some of the changes, and also what we're hearing on the ground from our pilot inspections, as well as the actual inspections now that they have started. And who better to talk us through all of this than Lee Owston, Lee Elliott, Andrea Dill-Russell and Jayne Coward. I'll let you all introduce yourselves and your roles, and let's start with you. Lee Owston.
 
Lee Owston: Hello, great to be here. I'm Lee Owston. I'm one of His Majesty's inspectors, and I'm Ofsted’s National Director of Education.
 
Lee Elliott: Hi everyone. I'm Lee Elliott. I'm the Assistant Regional Director for Education in the North East, Yorkshire and Humber.
 
Jayne Coward: Hi everyone. I'm Jayne coward. I am Deputy Director for early years regulatory policy and practice. Nice to be here.
 
Andrea Dill-Russell: Hello everyone. I'm Andrea Dill-Russell. I'm Senior His Majesty's Inspector in the policy team for further education and skills and teacher development.
 
Jonathan Bennett: Great. Thank you all. So, as we said, we will talk a bit about what we have seen on the ground as these inspections went through the pilot stages, and now they are live and we're inspecting. But let's just remind ourselves of some of the key changes to this renewed framework with you, Lee.
 
Lee Owston: Absolutely, and for those of you that have heard me talk before, I normally sum it up by saying the changes are essentially about making inspection look different, but also making it feel different too. So, we reviewed not only what our inspection materials make inspection look at, but also how we go about collecting evidence, because that's the bit that people often remember the most, because that's how we interact with them, that's how we have conversations with them at the point of inspection. And if I was to boil it down to the five key areas, I suppose, we've changed toolkits and the evaluation areas that we look at. We've changed how we report so we've introduced report cards. There's a new five-point grading scale, and of course, we've also more recently published our work around what our monitoring program would look like in schools, further education and skills. So, I just take each of those in turn and give you kind of a snapshot of what those changes mean in practice. And of course, I'm sure all of you will be clicking and downloading and looking at our toolkits, operating guides and inspection information documents to get more detail. But if I start with the toolkits and the evaluation areas, this was a replacement to our kind of framework and our school inspection, further education and skills inspection handbooks, early years inspection handbooks that we had previously. And it all started with the question, you know, what makes great provision? What are the component parts that allow fantastic early years settings, schools in all of their types, or indeed post-16 provision to do the job that they do. And of course, that's where we arrived in terms of the evaluation areas, whether that's around curriculum, teaching and training, whether that's in early years, around welfare and well-being, or indeed in schools, whether that's about attendance and behaviour. So we broke it down into those separate elements, and through our toolkits, exemplified what different grades look like for each of those areas. It therefore is the focal point for inspection. Those inspection toolkits show you what we'll focus on, how we'll evaluate and how we'll grade. And I suppose there's probably not a lot there that surprises people. You know, it is all of the things that you would expect great provision to be doing and to have in place, whether that's around leadership and governance or how well children, learners achieve. But I think the newer element is around inclusion. And of course, if you look at our toolkits, you'll see that there is a new inclusion evaluation area, but also, it's spread right across all of our other evaluation areas. So what does it mean to have an inclusive curriculum or inclusive teaching practices, so on and so forth across all of our remits? And just to give you a snapshot by inclusion, we mean, what is it that leaders are doing to help break down those barriers to learning and well-being, and that might be around children who are from disadvantaged backgrounds. It might be those who have special educational needs and or disabilities, or indeed, it might be those known to social care, so something that we've really helped to push to the front. And actually, if you listen to Sir Martyn as our Chief Inspector, you'll hear him talk about inclusion being at the heart of this renewed framework. So that was toolkits and evaluation areas. And as I said, please do download those if you want more detail on our website. Now linked to that is obviously how we report and this is one of the biggest changes, I would say, in probably our 30 plus year history as an organisation, we have fundamentally redesigned how we communicate what we find on inspection to predominantly parents and carers. So, our new report cards combine at a glance grades with the narrative summary of the strengths and the areas for improvement in wherever we've been. And we kind of tested lots of different types with parents and carers. And of course, what we've ended up with is something that allows you as a parent or carer to kind of click on what interests you most, what is of most importance to you in helping you decide where your child goes in terms of their next stage or their next setting. So, when those are published in January - so our first batch will be published in January - I'm sure people will find those far more helpful in terms of providing the detail that they want about their child's education. Now within those report cards, you'll obviously see a very different grading scale. From our testing, our piloting and our early inspections, we know the five-point grading scale and how it differs from what's gone before is something that we really need to help people understand and explain. So, first thing I want to say is the five-point grading scale cannot in any way be compared with the old grades. Can't be compared with the kind of four words that we've known from the past. It's a different approach to inspection. It's a new way of reporting. We wanted to change the culture of inspection, and in doing that, we started by changing the language that we use, and obviously that all came back to the words we used for evaluation and for grading. So, for example, you cannot equate the new exceptional grade with an outstanding grade that perhaps you've received previously, the two are not an automatic crossover. Equally, good in terms of the old system doesn't automatically equate with expected or strong. They are new grades with new standards, and importantly, those standards are aligned to, particularly the expected standard, with everything that providers are expected to do, whether that's written into statute, whether that's professional standards or non-statutory guidance. So everything in the expected standard has been crafted around everything that a provider is expected to do. And it's a high bar, because one of the things we've also introduced is this idea of a secure fit, so you have to, through inspection evidence, gathering, meet every one of the standards before you can be graded as the expected standard. And that's a shift from what we've known before, which was obviously a best fit. And a best fit, it was us learning from the Big Listen around inconsistency, and one of the things we unpicked was that a best fit inevitably allowed some institutions to achieve a grade on having some of the things that we'd written down, but not the others. And equally, the institution down the road could still get the same grade, but have a different mix of criteria, and that led to, you know, inconsistencies we heard through the Big Listen. So we've removed that, and now we've gone with a secure fit, which means you have to have all of the standards before you can be graded that particular standard. And
then the other thing just to touch upon is the needs attention grade. And I want to be really clear with everybody that's listening, that needs attention is simply an indication that there's work to be done to reach the expected standard. It's not a fail, but it does highlight where issues need to be addressed before they become even bigger problems that might need urgent improvement in the future.
And then the last thing on my list of five was around monitoring. And again, if you want to look at some of our guidance around monitoring for schools and further education and skills in particular, then you can download it from our website, but we've redesigned the system for monitoring and those two remits, particularly where there's a need for where we've perhaps graded needs attention or urgent improvement, we'll design a program and go back and offer, obviously, leaders reassurance that they're on the right track and improvement is happening, but also reassure parents and carers that obviously things are getting better. And
where we see those improvements, we'll be able to recognise them more quickly and change a grade on a report card there and then at the point of monitoring without leaders and others having to wait for a full inspection, 2,3,4 years down the line in previous models before their hard work has been recognised. So, plenty more I could say about monitoring, but I'll leave it there for now and just say there's plenty that we've reformed. And of course, in making all of those changes based on the Big Listen. We also want to make sure that the intention we all had in our minds in making improvements, or the reality that we see on the ground through inspection.
 
Jonathan Bennett: Thanks, Lee. And just to pick up on a few of the things there, because as you and I go out and about and we listen quite a lot, get a lot of questions in. And I think the secure fit and best fit change is one that we get quite a lot of questions around, so it's good to get the clarity on what that actually means. One of the things we've also heard, though, is that with the toolkits, that it's not just a sort of schools toolkit, in an early years toolkit, it actually breaks down into a lot more detail, doesn't it depending on which part of that sector you're working in?
 
Lee Owston: It does, you're right. So, it's different by design. So not only have we made sure that the early years toolkit speaks to the early years and schools and further education and skills, but even within each remit, we know there's a vast variety of different provision types, and we've made sure that at the start of every evaluation area within each of those remit toolkits, we talk about the differences, for example, between a childminder and registered or group based provision in early years. Or, in schools, we talk about the difference between a primary and secondary at a very kind of high level, or indeed, UTCs or small schools or specialist provision, where there are slight nuances to how we might go about gathering our evidence. And further education and skills, we try and cover the four main provision types, but even within those, there'll be differences, because we've tried really hard to build more of a provider's context into the way in which we go about gathering evidence and, of course, evaluating them and awarding a grade.
 
Jonathan Bennett: And the other thing that's probably important to remember, we still get quite a lot of questions about it, is that when you talk about the read across and that there isn't one between the set of grades and the previous ones, the main difference, there isn't just one grade now, is it? So it's not, you won't get just exceptional or strong standard. It's dependent on the different evaluation areas.
 
Lee Owston: It is, and that's something that state-funded schools saw the earliest back in September 2024 - we removed the overall effectiveness grade at the request of the Secretary of State. With the launch of the renewed framework, we've just made sure that every other remit is kind of brought into line. So, we've removed those headline grades, those overall effectiveness grades, that captured an awful lot under one banner and can often hide the separate strengths and the even better ifs or the next steps. And now we've made it far more nuanced, as I said earlier, by enabling parents and carers predominantly to focus on what matters most to them, but even when they've selected that, for example, attendance and behaviour in schools, to then see a narrative description alongside a side a grade.
 
Jonathan Bennett: And of course, the first lot of report cards are going to be published this month. So, let's go over to you Lee Elliott - I'm sorry to be using surnames but with two Lees I have to. You've been on some of the school's inspections, and what have we sort of heard from the pilots and these early inspections? You know, what is working well, where have we had to make tweaks?
 
Lee Elliott: Yeah, absolutely. And it's been really interesting for me in my role to be out leading an inspection, and out quality assuring inspections of late and Lee referenced earlier on in the discussion, inspections looking and feeling different. And I can certainly say with confidence for me, from my point of view as a lead inspector, it certainly felt different in a really positive way, and the feedback that I've had from head teachers and other senior leaders when I've quality assured inspections of late, it's been quite similar as well. And I think what struck me the most, I suppose we've always had school leaders at the heart of inspection in terms of that dialog etc, but what struck me the most with the renewed inspections is the amount of high quality ongoing professional dialog between leaders in the inspection team and that sort of greater sense of shared insights. And I suppose what I mean by that are those regular opportunities for leaders to hear from the team about what they're seeing and what the emerging evidence tells us, as well as, of course, opportunities for leaders to show inspectors aspects of the school that work well and aspects that they're particularly proud of, I suppose, as well. And that regular dialog for me as a lead inspector really allowed me to get a detailed understanding of the school and to hear from the head teacher about the impact of their work on pupils learning, and that dialog, it starts right from the off, doesn't it? You know, that notification call, when we make the call to the school, we've made a change, and we're trying to endeavour now to have that notification call via teams or Google meet, you know, a video call, rather than across the telephone, and that helps to build that constructive working relationship, that professional dialog from the off. Being able to see the head teacher and senior leaders on the call was really helpful to me to establish that sort of professional discussion from the off, but also logistically, when it came to things like organising and co-constructing the timetable, we were able to do that together on screen and populate it together, and that really made a difference and helped us, quite literally, hit the ground running as an inspection team and as a school. I'm not sure if that was a similar thing for you, Jayne and Andrea, it certainly looked and felt different to me in that regard.
 
Jayne Coward: Yeah, I'd say with that, with my early years hat on, absolutely, I think that planning calls been a bit of a revelation, actually, and I agree with lots of what you've said, it's just a really good opportunity to establish that positive professional working relationship ahead of the inspector relying on site and providers have told us that they've really welcomed that opportunity to talk about the context of their setting, to set out what their strengths are as well as what they're working on. I think they've had real confidence to be to have those open and transparent conversations right from the start. And feedback that we've had is that they feel inspections are done with them rather than to them. So, Lee talked about inspections that look and feel different, and that's really hard to demonstrate until you're actually out there doing the pilots and doing the live inspection. So, I think by the time the inspector walks through the door on the first day of the inspection, it can get off to really great start, because this is those really positive relationships, and providers have told us that they felt listened to, which I think is really important. Have you had similar Andrea?
 
Andrea Dill-Russell: Yeah. I mean, in particular, in further education and skills, Lee's already outlined the sort of the variety and range of the providers that we inspect, but I think in particular the fact that from the time that we sort of make that notification call, you know, on teams, you can sort of meet with people in a much more collaborative process. Part Two of the planning call, in particular, where you just giving the senior leaders and the nominee the time to talk about their different types of provision, the different types of curriculum and the learners and apprentices that they're working with has been really important, and the fact that lead inspectors have taken the time to listen and understand the context and then worked collaboratively to then sort of agree the inspection focused areas, part of the sort of the final, final part of the call, rather than what's tended to happen previously, when you'd go in with a preconceived idea about what you were going to look at, and obviously that's a significant change, and very much from what you said, Jayne, that sort of repeatedly as I've led inspections team inspections and been out and QA them that that providers are, I would say, overall, saying that they feel like they're being listened to. And then when we do the orientation meeting on the first day of inspection, where the lead inspector is then reflecting back what they've said to the rest of the team, they're finding that really quite powerful, because it does demonstrate that the lead inspectors have understood and then have used that to really inform the inspection team about what the inspection methodology, the activities are going to look like, but it's all been set around their context and what they've and what they've told us about, which has been, as I say, I just think really, really powerful. I think the interesting thing from FES, and it would be interesting interesting to see what Lee's view is, sorry, Lee Elliot, not Lee Owston – or Lee Owston might have a view - is that we've always had nominees in FES, and so it was like, well, actually, this might not be that much of a difference for us, but I think what we've definitely seen, it strengthened the role of the nominee, because they feel even more so they're part of the team. They've got that sort of collaborative work. And therefore, throughout the inspection, as the inspection is evolving, it's definitely an evolving piece now, rather than you know that that piece is finished, and then we'll move on to the next piece. But they're part of those ongoing conversations, through reflection as to so we know where do we need to move the inspection team now, now obviously we sort of seen that we've celebrated or validated, or know where things might look sort of like slightly differently or better, and that's helped us sort of move, I think, through inspections, so that there is that ongoing collaborative work that doesn't just take place at planning. So, I don't know how others are found through the introduction of the nominee, I'd be interested to know really.
 
Lee Elliott: Yeah, it's a really interesting point, isn't it, Andrea, and I've seen it working really well on FES inspections as well, and was interested to see how it transfers to school inspections. The inspection that I led, you know, we make it really clear to school leaders that the nominee is there to support them, but they absolutely won't be disadvantaged if they don't choose to have a nominee. And on my pilot inspection, the school didn't want to have a nominee, because they said that the person they would have nominated to carry out that role would have been the deputy head, and the deputy head was going to be in on the meetings. And it worked really well for that school during that inspection. But equally, I've seen inspections where the nominee has made a real impact, because we know schools are busy places, and in many schools, especially some of the primary schools that have been in on inspection, you know, quite often they might get a parent wants to speak the head teacher unannounced, and schools have got to operate as normal, even when inspectors are there, and that nominee role just helps ease the sort of load on senior leaders. The head teacher helps the inspection team work closely with a really knowledgeable nominee who knows the school inside out, and they can help provide additional evidence, or they can speak to staff if there's an amendment to the timetable. So, I've seen it work in both ways, without a nominee really well, but with a nominee really well. And I think it just gives schools that additional sort of flexibility to be able to work well with inspection teams.
 
Andrea Dill-Russell: It does show that, doesn’t it, we always said that we would tailor inspections under renewed framework, and actually we are definitely doing that and fully in line with the operating guide, which is really important.
 
Jonathan Bennett: I was going to say coming to you, Jayne, how is that translating in early years, which, again, is very, very different.
 
Jayne Coward: So, so again, similar to what Lee said, I mean, we set out with an expectation that for the childminders, or very small provision, we likely wouldn't have a nominee, particularly for a childminder where they're often operating on their own and they are the person that knows the children best. But like Lee and Andrea have said, when you're inspecting a larger, more complex nursery based provision, then absolutely we've seen through the pilots and the live inspections where that nominee role has worked well to have that kind of coordination and be that link with the inspection team. So to have the flexibility to use it where it's appropriate to use it has been really important. But I think one of the key changes we found in early years is it's the manager having or the deputy, whoever the person is, that's going to come around with you, them being there and seeing at the same time as the lead inspector, what's happening within a provision has been like gold dust, because you can have the opportunity in the moment to say, you know, is this typical of practice that we've seen in this room, and I think that's been really important in terms of having that shared experience and then being able to move on and have those collaborative conversations about what you've seen together, rather than kind of coming back and saying, Oh, well, I saw this. It's much more helpful when you when you see things together, and you can have those in the moment discussions.
 
Jonathan Bennett: And all this talk of nominees is a good opportunity to plug our nominee training videos, which are on our Ofsted YouTube channel. So, if once you have thought of or decided who your nominee should be, then that training is available. Just search for Ofsted on YouTube and you'll see the training and it's, it's per remit as well. The things that you mentioned, and what I was going to ask you, because we get a lot of questions about, is the planning call. It's obviously, it's the sort of the starting point of the relationship that you talk about, and this more collaborative approach. From having been on planning calls now, what would you say to leaders, or how would you make sure giving them advice now on this, on this podcast, that they make the most of the planning, what can they be doing? Because we are getting a lot of questions from leaders that say, you know, what do I need to prepare, what do I need to bring? So, in your view, when planning calls have gone well, what have leaders done?
 
Lee Elliott: Really interesting question, and something that I was going to touch on in terms of inspections feeling different and looking different, because in the past, you know, an inspector would have done their prep. They would have had a look at curriculum plans, from websites and so on, and you would have had a sense of what the day one timetable was going to look like. And you might have pre-populated a timetable, 90% of the timetable before making that call. On my pilot inspection, I could safely say maybe 80% of the timetable was blank, because what I wanted to do with the head teacher in that notification call was listen to the head teacher talk to me about the context of their school, talk to me about the work that they've done since the last inspection, and talk to me also about aspects of the school that they felt inspectors could see and might be able to celebrate. And so together, we really co-constructed that timetable and populated the timetable with learning walks to see aspects of provision that the school were proud of, to see aspects of provision where they started working of late and were seeing early impact. And that was really that that sort of collaborative approach. And it was interesting to hear Andrea say inspectors were hearing from providers, say that inspections were being done with and not to, and that they were feeling listened to. And I think that notification call was really key to be able to have that equal partnership to construct the timetable, to get a sense of that context and the uniqueness of the school for me.
 
Jonathan Bennett: So leaders should come prepared, sort of to think about and talk about how they want to, to explore their setting review on the day.
 
Lee Elliott: Yeah, I don't think it's a sense of coming prepared, because leaders know their school inside out anyway. It's just making sure that they're able to articulate to us in that time available what it is that works well, you know, what they're proud of and what they want us to see as inspectors, so that we, by the end of the two day process, we get to see that inside out.
 
Lee Owston: Can I just jump in because that's just made me reflect on one of those other questions I often get asked, which is around self-evaluation. And it links to what Lee was just saying there, because people automatically assume that by self-evaluation we mean extensive document and for the record, that is not what inspectors expect to see. We're not returning to the days of, you know, lengthy SEFs, particularly in the schools and schools space. For me, self-evaluation is a verb. It's a process. It's a process of knowing about your provider, your institution. As Lee’s just said, everything that you do really well, all of the things that are on your desk as a leader, because you're dealing with them now, because you know a school or a setting, or a provider as a living, breathing entity, isn't it all. It's always evolving and moving forward. And of course, inspection therefore, is about starting with a conversation. It's not starting by a sharing of documents that we then go away and separately unpick. So, my one bit of advice to people would be, don't see self-evaluation as an onerous task of constantly filling in a document and updating it, because that's not what we want to see. We just want a conversation from the very first point of inspection all the way throughout the two, three, however many days we might be on site, because essentially, we want to help you celebrate, validate, and with fresh eyes, highlight the things that you might not have on your radar yet, but would really support you in that continuous improvement process.
 
Andrea Dill-Russell: Yeah, and I can I just sort of add there that, I think what sort of sort of part of that reflection, for me, was the fact that we sort of no longer do deep dives, which really did sort of shoehorn you into looking at a subject in particular – well, in FES anyway – because you're listening to what leaders are saying from a self-assessment point of view, basically what they know about, what's going well, what they're working on etc, means that you can really open out the inspection focused areas to be about themes, to be about groups, and not just about subjects, which means actually, they're more valuable for providers, because they're getting more sort of helpful feedback around what is working well. So, you're doing the validation, but then you can highlight sort of potentially areas that they might want to sort of continue to work on or improve, particularly where, if you're looking at certain groups of learners that are on a construction course, may well be doing really well, but if a similar group of learners are on hospitality through that sort of curriculum is not working quite so well that inspectors now through those sort of professional conversations can talk about why that may or may not be sort of happening. So it's actually more valuable for the provider because they're getting more helpful feedback through those conversations and really sort of like, sort of understanding, you know, what is working well and what's working less well means that the inspection focus areas are just more helpful fo sort of the improvement, for providers, sort of more overall.
 
Jayne Coward: I was just going to build on that, Andrea, I agree. And you know, we've been out and about doing lots of webinars and presentations, obviously to make sure everybody feels comfortable with the with the new inspection toolkits. And that's the question we probably get asked most often is, what can we do so that we're in the best place we can be when you come and it absolutely is giving them the confidence that they know their children the best. You said that about school leave, if I go into a nurse nursery or a child minder setting, they are the people that know their children best. And if they're doing what's right for their children within that setting, particularly the most vulnerable and disadvantaged, then they'll be doing what's right for Ofsted. And I think that planning call is a really good conversation starter. It's around half an hour. Don't want providers to think that they have to cram everything that they know about their setting into that 30 minutes. It's absolutely to get those key highlights around the context, what the setting feel they are doing well, what areas they're working on. So absolutely, we can co-construct those areas of inspection focus, but then we've got the time on inspection to really get underneath, to have those professional conversations, to observe the practice and the interactions, to talk to staff, to do all of those lovely activities, which, you know, if you've read the operating guide, you'll get more detail around. It's a scene setter, but really important for me, it's around establishing that really good professional working relationship from the outset. So have confidence in yourselves and what you know about your setting, because that will put you in a really good place for the inspection.
 
Jonathan Bennett: I like what you said there about the sort of the co-constructing, because it is a conversation, isn't it? It's not you as the inspector saying what you want to look at or just leaving it entirely, it's working out the best way to inspect that particular setting between the setting leader and the inspector.
 
Jayne Coward: Absolutely.
 
Jonathan Bennett: So I could talk about this for ages, but we are mindful of making sure that we don't stretch into sort of a three hour marathon podcast. But I think we will probably come back to this topic as inspections continue and we continue to learn. On that basis, Lee Owston, I just want to sort of finish with you. How is the process of inspection going to continue into January and beyond, because it is new for us as Ofsted right now, but it's going to be new for schools and for early years settings and for colleges and everyone else in further education for quite a while to come.
 
Lee Owston: It is, and we're very conscious of that. Depending on when your inspection is due, you might be coming to this in one year, two year, three years or more down the down the line. So, we have a series of materials. And if you go to our YouTube channel, there's a series of videos there, you can see lots of our webinar material that we delivered in September and October time to help people understand what inspection meant specifically for them, and we have webinars for broad range of kind of provision types. And of course, as we learn more about inspections, we'll continue to put other materials out there that we know will be supportive. For example, we've got a recent video, haven't we, about explaining the difference between the old grading system and the five-point grading scale. Some material around that number one question I get asked, ‘when will I be inspected’? And of course, across the spring and summer, we'll continue to build the number of inspections that we deliver so that we get back to business as usual as quickly as possible. However, particularly from myself, coming from a policy perspective, we're always keen to listen and learn and adapt, whether that's tweaking our materials, providing further comms or clarity to the sector, or indeed, further bits of training for our inspectors and all of that, or most of that you will be able to find with full transparency on the usual channels when you wish to see it. And ultimately, we've also commissioned an independent review, and that independent review will continue over the next couple of years to report back to us on what we're finding. So again, we can learn and we can adapt and celebrate what you've heard today in terms of where the policy intention is having its intended effect and making inspection feel and look much better than it has before.
 
Jonathan Bennett: Great. Thank you. So, I want to thank you all for your time. I hope those of you who have been listening and found that useful. As Lee mentioned, you can either go on to the Ofsted gov.uk page where we have a whole host of blogs and more coming and information around inspection, or the Ofsted YouTube channel where we also have all of those webinars and various different bits of video explainers, talking through the different aspects of inspection, depending on what kind of setting you're in. We're usually at a lot of events as well. So, if you know that Ofsted are there, come and speak to us on the stand. We always have experts there, and you can ask us questions. We're always happy to help. And obviously we're all on all of our social channels as well. So we're on X, on LinkedIn and on Facebook, so look us up, there's more information constantly on those channels as well. So Lee Owston, Lee Elliott, Andrea Dill-Russell and Jayne Coward, thank you very much for your time, and until the next Ofsted talks, I'll bid you farewell.
 

Thinking about becoming an apprentice? Is someone you know looking to their future? In this episode we look at apprenticeships, focusing on the North West of England and speak to an apprentice at the University Hospitals of Liverpool group. 
 
Hi everyone, and welcome to this edition of Ofsted Talks. I'm Briony Balsom and this time we're exploring all things apprenticeships. I'm joined here today by Lynn Masterson, who's Vice Principal of commercial and growth at Hugh Baird College in Liverpool, Lisa Daniels, who's currently an apprentice on foundation degree through Hugh Baird but based at University Hospitals of Liverpool group, Fiona O'Shea, also at Hugh Baird, and by Ruth Stammers, one of our senior His Majesty's Inspectors of Further Education and Skills here at Ofsted. Just to set us off, Ruth, we probably think we know, but do we? What is an apprenticeship?
 
Ruth: Okay, so for those who might not know what an apprenticeship is, essentially it's a job where you learn alongside your job. So, they're open to anybody from the age of sixteen onwards. So we see apprentices, obviously quite young ones coming out of school, and we see apprentices retraining into different careers, well into their sixties, sometimes even their seventies, believe it or not. A kind of standard apprenticeship is usually either one day a week in college and four days a week in work, or with a with a training provider for one day. Or sometimes they're on a block release program, so they might be in work for a number of weeks and then go on a block of training for, say, a week or two at a college or training provider. Apprentices get paid a normal wage, so there is a basic apprenticeship wage, which is quite low, let's be honest. A lot of employers do pay their apprentices more than the standard apprenticeship wage, which is really important. And then there's other apprenticeships that actually are quite highly paid. So we've got apprentices from level two, which can be a lot of the kind of construction trades, automotive, healthcare, early years, those kind of entry level jobs right up to apprenticeships at level seven, which are senior leaders. And solicitors - really high level apprenticeships. There has been a little bit of change to funding recently, so some of those level seven apprenticeships are no longer going to be funded by the government but lots of the lower level ones are. And the reason for that really is, is to try and attract people into some of those entry level jobs, the level two and three apprenticeships, so that those who are out of the job market currently or furthest from the job market through unemployment, have got a route into employment with training as well, and and hopefully a long standing career alongside that.
Briony: I mean, Ruth has described an enormous breadth in apprenticeships. So presumably there is no such thing as a typical apprentice.
Lynn: No there isn't. Apprentices can come from many different backgrounds, very different circumstances. So, you know, we can sort of have an apprentice who will come from school, who's maybe made the decision that they don't want to pursue an A-level, uh, or they just want to end their time at school, and they're looking to find themselves at a career for life. There'll be opportunities where people will maybe be thinking further forward than just how they can earn money now. So there will also be people who maybe want to retrain, who've been in a job that they feel they'd like to gain a skill in something else so they can be different ages. You can as as Ruth has just said, you can have apprentices that will start at sixteen, and you can have apprentices that will also go up to, um, in the sixties or 70s. So there's no such thing. It's a common misconception that apprentices are young people leaving school. That is not the case. And a lot of people we find now are opting for apprenticeships just so that they don't have a level of debt as they're making their studies, because there's such a variety of apprenticeships now. You've got a big choice.
 
Briony: So you've mentioned misconceptions there. And I think, you know, do you find that there are some common misconceptions and misunderstandings about what an apprenticeship and therefore what an apprentice is?
Lynn: A lot of people have a misconception that when you're an apprentice, you're basically doing jobs like making the tea on a site. That is absolutely not the case because apprenticeships have changed significantly. What most apprenticeships you will find will have they'll be released for usually a day to attend college or a training provider. You can deliver actually in the workplace to an apprentice. You don't have to come in to training. There is a set programme of training and everybody is usually allocated a mentor so that as you're learning, you've got somebody alongside you who can give you that guidance as well as the work. So employers play a large part within apprenticeships just to make sure that that the people who are apprentices are gaining those skills and they're getting the experience they need to enable them to do that job at the end of their apprenticeship and probably an increase in their pay as their skills have increased.
 
Briony: Yeah, so I'm already fishing out from both what you and Ruth have said some enormous benefits of, um, both being an apprentice and taking on apprentices. What would you say are the key sort of bonuses for an individual to be in, to be an apprentice and take on an apprenticeship?
 
Lynn: The benefits for being an apprentice would be to earn as you learn, so you immediately start to earn money. You're actually not just learning or gaining skills. When you go into college or your training provider, you are actually gaining those skills every day. And that's set you head and shoulders above anybody who is just coming and doing that and going and going into a training environment. You can demonstrate those skills by the end of your apprenticeship training. And I just think it's, it's an all round better way to gain experience and to be able to actually prove that you can do that, be assured that you can do the job at the end of it.
 
Briony: Yeah. Proven was what sprang to mind. You're proven in the workplace – Ruth?
 
Ruth: Yeah. So I was just going to add, I think Lynn might have said earlier, but this one's massive, really is. Um, if you are an apprentice doing a degree apprenticeship as well, you have no student debt at all. So, you know, people coming out of A-levels or BTECs going to university, um, are paying their fees, which I think are nine and a half thousand a year now, aren't they? They've just gone up again. Um, and with an apprenticeship it's entirely free to the individual. So it's completely funded by, by the government and/or the employer. Um, so that that's a massive bonus to anybody rather than someone who's going to a full time university program. And as well as that, they're getting the hands on experience. While any apprentice really, um, at any level, is getting hands on experience and developing, you know, life skills, time management, decision making, increasing confidence, you know, working with others, learning to work in a team, All things that you can put on on your CV that are really valuable moving through your career, which is just huge for young people really, or anybody going into the workplace.
 
Briony: Huge number. And I'm looking at it from the other side. Um, now. So what would you say, uh, coming to you first Lynn because you must have conversations with employers about this all the time. What are the main what do you picture as the main benefits of taking on an apprentice?
 
Lynn: You are helping a young person to gain the skills that they need to forge a career for life. You are giving people a chance and opportunity. Some hope that they are going to be able to have a - you're helping them with their lifestyle in the future, and you are supporting them to to gain the skills that they need to to obviously go into employment. What we find with a lot of employers is that a young person will come and they'll be doing their training, and when they come back from training, they they will say, oh, we don't do it like that in college. We do this. Or have you thought about using something digitally? And we find that employers often get some benefit from apprentices. Apprentices making suggestions of things that they've seen whilst they were doing the training that can be used in the workplace. The significant majority of apprentices that we have, ninety eight percent, go on to employment either with the same employer or with another employer. As long as that apprentice has had quality training experience, they have gained the skills. They're head and shoulders above somebody who comes in with with a qualification. And that's not to downplay qualifications because of course they are important. But if you have that qualification alongside the skills, then you you are a real of real benefit to an employer.
Briony: Yeah. So I mean, for balance, we should also look at the challenges as well, presumably taking on both an apprenticeship as an individual and an apprentice. Um, both entail a huge amount of work and will come with come with a number of, if not challenges. A number of burdens on the individual or the employer. Um, how to um, I think we'll talk to Lisa in in a little while and find out about any elements of taking on an apprenticeship that you found particularly tough, but from a from a business side, what people find most challenging when taking on an apprentice.
Lynn: It's organising the workload sometimes, is difficult. So for example, if you have got a carpentry and joinery apprentice and you mainly fit doors and skirting boards, when you take an apprentice on before they'll be signed up, you have to know that you're going to cover the breadth of skills that need to be covered in the apprenticeship to make that young person or, uh, whoever you take on, ready to undertake that role. Sometimes things are as simple as coming along and saying, I've decided to have an apprenticeship apprentice and you need to set pay as you earn up. Think about setting that up because your apprentice, if you're if you're a small business and you don't have a payroll, you do need to have a payroll in place to set the apprentice up. Thinking about who's going to mentor that apprentice because they're a day, a college, let's say, and they're eighty percent in the workplace. You can't leave the apprentice, you know, to just get on. You you have to mentor that apprentice. And whilst that's very easy to if you have a workforce and if you're working alongside the apprentice, it's easy to accommodate. It does need to take some, it does need to have some thought behind it, so that you can be sure that that apprentice has the support that that he or she needs to to get there to complete the apprenticeship.
 
Briony: Yeah, I'm sure. And is that something that you, as a college offer support to employers on?
Lynn: Yes, we have a business development team who will go out and support employers with all of that, with how much, um, wages have to be paid. Signing up of contracts and things. And they'll also advise employers because the other benefit that there is is there are other grants available. If you take a sixteen to eighteen year old on, you get one thousand pounds from the government. Um, but also there are other organisations that give grants and particular local authorities that will give grants to support employers taking on apprenticeships. There's also a benefit really, as well, a lot of procurement that is in place now in the North West is on the condition of employers taking an apprentice on. So, you know, we go and offer help with that.
Briony: And just to localize this a bit, and bring this to the North West where you're located.
Lynn: So we have, um, a significant number of healthcare apprentices because that that is a it's a huge area nationally. So we we have a lot we we saw our healthcare apprentices when I joined here nine years ago go from six apprentices. And we've trained in excess of four hundred and thirty apprentices with five different trusts. And that continues to to grow and healthcare apprentices, people will think of traditional, but not only of the traditional nursing type routes. There are also administration. There's also HR, those sorts of apprenticeships. And we've just introduced one in one of the trusts, which is um, for cleaning apprenticeships, which obviously infection prevention and control and sustainable methods of cleaning are high priorities here. So that's something we've seen grow as well as some teaching apprenticeships for people who are ward managers or doctors who are having to mentor people with it that they're in charge of. So we've seen that grow. Our one we’re pioneering at the minute is a highway maintenance apprenticeship, because there's huge growth in construction within the North West area. So our growth we see a lot in here. So what we're looking at the moment is highway maintenance groundworks. We're looking at all of those. We do have a lot of traditional apprenticeships like carpentry and joinery, electrical. So there's there's a lot. But again all linked to construction trades.
Briony: Yeah I mean it sounds Ruth it sounds like Lynn seeing a huge increase in numbers taking up apprenticeships and in different areas of apprenticeships are thriving. Is that something that we're seeing nationally that numbers are rising both in terms of apprentices and apprenticeship areas on offer?
Ruth: I think it's, um, It's hit and miss really. So I think we've gone through phases of apprenticeships being really - so post Covid apprenticeship numbers went up quite a bit and then have dropped off and started to plateau a little bit. I think it depends on the area of the country you're in. So where, um, where Hugh Baird is in, in Bootle, in Liverpool. There is quite a lot of, um, construction and manufacturing going on around there. And there's a lot of work going on around, around the dock that I think is going to create more apprenticeships in the future. Um, and we've seen in the North West definitely a big upsurge in, in all courses, not just apprenticeships but certainly in construction is huge, um, engineering and manufacturing. There's a lot of that around the North West. You know, we've got a large aerospace, um, industry around here, lots of logistics, transport, manufacturing in the North West. And then we're seeing quite a lot more digital as well, which I think kind of a lot of them are done online. So doesn't really matter where the training provider or the college is because a lot of the learning is is done solely online. So apprentices can be anywhere in the country, don't really need to come to the college or the provider. And as Lynn was saying before, health and social care as well is growing, um, a lot. And I think that's mainly because a lot of the, the NHS trusts and also other healthcare providers are moving more into apprenticeships as a recruitment model as opposed to other other routes in through other methods of recruiting staff. Um, so that one's definitely growing as well.
 
Briony: What do we know about apprentices next steps? Because presumably there's an option to do a higher level apprenticeship sometimes, or to um, or to just go into employment and move away from apprenticeships for a while.
Ruth: We see quite a lot of apprentices, especially in health, that are moving through the levels, um, early years as well. Some that start at level two go on to level three and onto onto level four, some into teaching. Health definitely a ladder up from level two to three and four and onwards. We're seeing construction, not so much, I'm going to say usually if people do a level two or level three in, in a trade, you know, plumbing, carpentry and joinery, bricklaying, plastering, those kind of things, they tend to do their apprenticeship and then go into employment, not necessarily move onwards. Some might do go into, you know, site supervision, but most will do their apprenticeship and then work in their trade. So I think it depends on the sector really. Um, and if you'd agree with that, Lynn, from what you see nodding away, does that sound familiar?
Lynn: Does sound absolutely familiar. We have a lot of people in level two construction, but very few go on to level three because that's supervision. But in healthcare it healthcare is is so good, and also childcare as well. To be fair at seeing those seeing people progress through those levels, as Lisa is a testimony to.
Briony: Just before, I'm going to bring in Lisa in a second. Go on. I really want to hear from someone who's actually on the coalface taking one of these apprenticeships. Um, but just before we do, I'd really love to touch on learners with special educational needs and disabilities. Um, and a different group of of learners from more disadvantaged backgrounds. And, um, hear from you, Lynn. I suppose in terms of what, um, what opportunities, um, are, are accessible to them and how apprenticeships might, might be a good step for people joining from those, um, those groups.
Lynn: Yeah. I think apprenticeships are a really good step for people from those groups. So when you start an apprenticeship, you somebody will sit down with you and have a look at what skills you've got already, and they'll try and look at where you are. And that's a that's an interview that happens one to one. And then you get an opportunity then to talk about any additional support needs that you may have, whatever they are. And from whatever background you come from and what what we would do then is we can put support into place. We have a dedicated student support team and we can make those concessions. We have funding that supports people who may need a little bit of help to get there. If it's a trade, tools and materials, we have people that you can come and talk to if you feel things are getting overwhelming. So you've literally got your employer and you've also got your college or training provider that you can go to for that additional support. We have learning support teams here that will know about people's additional support needs, and we can put things in place to make sure that those needs are met, both in the classroom and in the workplace. We work hand in hand with employer. So it's it's quite a good opportunity for you to be able to talk to somebody one to one and say, look, I need this or I'm struggling and I need this sort of support. I think people we find here, they they perform extremely well compared to those who who don't have any additional support needs, because you've got that one to one assistance, there's always somebody you can go to that will help you through.
Briony: Yeah, that's wonderful to hear. It sounds like a fabulous option. Um, Lisa, thank you so much for joining us today. Um, I mean, I'm going to jump straight in, and I'd love to hear just why you chose, um, the apprenticeship that you did and why you chose an apprenticeship at all.
Lisa: I suppose, um, I chose an apprenticeship when I first started with the NHS trust. I've always been a carer, even in the community. It was something that I've always wanted to be. I've always wanted to be a nurse. So I took the apprenticeship from level two to level five. It's given me confidence, something I thought I'd never be able to do in my life. I left school when I was fourteen. It's been amazing to me all the way through if I've ever needed anything supported me.
Briony: I mean, we spoke earlier about, um, apprentices then being in the workforce with proven skills. And you spoke about confidence, and those two seem to go hand in hand. I mean, you're you're doing what you're learning in the workplace every single day. And that just must be an enormous confidence boost that you just, you know, that you're you know, that you can do the job because you've proven to yourself that you can. How are you finding it? I mean, working and studying side by side must bring some challenges.
Lisa: A couple of months ago, I was off with health problems. I had a bit of a cancer scare. So we had to have operation. I could say some of the pressures in work when you can't get off to come to college. But when you get it structured down, you’re fine.
 
Briony: Yeah. I mean, the balance, um, that Lynn and Ruth have spoken about of the the four days working and one day studying model is that is does that ring true for you? Is that how your week is balanced? Do you find that, um, you can entirely wrap up your study in one day. Or do you find that the study’s on your mind while you're at work and it's difficult to?
Lisa: Yeah, the study is worrying about it's always there. And like you say, your weekends that you've got free, you do study, but at the end of it it is worth it. I do applied biological science, health and social care lifespan through my job because I'm a assistant practitioner with the alcohol team at Aintree, and it goes great into all the fundamental nursing practices that we do.
Briony: And is it continuous assessment along the way or do you have an assessment at the end?
Lisa:  I have an assessment at the end, which is face to face observations.
 
Briony: And what's next for you when you breeze through that? What's next for you?
 
Lisa: I want to be a nurse. I want to continue and be a nurse and give back to what the hospital gives to me when I was younger.
Briony: And the connections that you've made during your apprenticeship are those do you feel that those have placed you well for looking for that, that permanent employment post apprenticeship?
Lisa: Uh, yes. You do. Um, they do. It's a I think it's a year like a top up, which you get more into giving out medication and stuff. And that's the only part I need to become a nurse.
Fiona: Can I just interject? I'm Lisa's tutor. Lisa and I have worked together, um, for the last six years. Um, Lisa first joined me on her level three apprenticeship. And you were working, um, within the clinical team as a HCA. Um, uh, within the hospital. Um, and from there and over, over her journey, Lisa has progressed to, I think you've got a distinction for your endpoint assessment on your level three. Um, she came back to me again to do her foundation degree assistant practitioner, having moved into the alcohol team and taking on additional responsibilities. And, you know, the difference in Lisa's confidence from when I very first met her and not particularly i her skills as a healthcare practitioner were always excellent and were always very, very evident. But what she's gaining across doing the foundation degree element is more enhanced knowledge within her scope of practice. Um, because the course very much focuses on where the individual is working within a team. And that seems to be something like within the NHS, looking at the NHS ten year plan and you know how they want to retain their experienced staff, but support them to upskill and to take on more responsible roles. Which she now works in independently across the hospital. She's, um, you know, managing her own caseload and supporting patients through their journey. Alcohol recovery, but also through the sort of the physical elements that, um, alcohol can, can cause for individuals. The idea being that that the, the teams will then get and, you know, a skilled practitioner within their area. So, so that, uh, you know what the, the, um, NHS teams appear to want to do is, is to have people at that band four level to be able to support the rest of the healthcare support team and bridge that gap between the practitioner and the healthcare team to to support, you know, really effective outcomes for the patients.
Briony: Yeah. And I think skilled practitioner just underpins everything that we've spoken about today, isn't it? Where you're, um, as an employer, you're not taking a risk because you've already got someone who's proven in that space. Yeah. I mean, Lisa, what a glowing testimonial. And what a great good news story, um, for both employers and apprentices alike. I can't think of a better way to leave our chat today. I want to thank everyone who's joined us. It's been incredibly enlightening for me, knowing very little about apprenticeships beforehand and that portal into the world of apprenticeships. And I'm sure it's been the same for all of the listeners. And to everyone listening, thank you as ever for joining us, and we'll see you at the next Ofsted talks.

In this episode, colleagues from the National Day Nurseries Association join Ofsted to discuss the report into the importance of the first two years of a child's life: Getting it right from the start: how early years practitioners work with babies and toddlers - GOV.UK
 
Briony Balsom  Hello everyone, and welcome to this edition of Ofsted Talks. I'm Bryony Balsam, and this time, we're focusing on early years, on 'Getting it right from the start, how early years practitioners work with babies and toddlers.' And indeed, that is the title of our recently released report. So the research explores how early years practitioners understand the Early Years Foundation Stage framework and apply it to the education and care of babies and toddlers. So we're talking up to two years. It draws largely on a series of visits to early years settings, a survey and some inspector focus groups. So joining us today, we have Fiona Bland, who is from the National Day Nurseries Association, Kiran Singh, who's one of Ofsted's Research and Evaluation leads and was involved in writing and producing the report. And we have Wendy Ratcliff, who is Ofsted's lead for early education. Hello, everybody. So Wendy, just to kick us off then, why did we produce the report? 
Wendy Ratcliff  Really good question, and there's a bit of history there. So when we were doing our 'Best start in life research review 'series, one of the things that came out from that was that, we're aware that there's very little research out there around babies, around our youngest children. And I think that's you know, that that's really important for us at a time when the government are looking are increasing funding, there'll be more babies in settings from September in in terms of the childcare reforms. The other thing we know that those first two years lay those important foundations for all future learning, and that babies' development just needs to be encouraged, supported, and, you know, monitored by adults. It's so vitally important to get those first two years right. 
Briony Balsom  Yeah, so I think the report starts out by saying what we know instinctively to be the case, that those first two years are really crucial to a child's development. 
Briony Balsom  Why is it that they're so important? Could you tell us a little bit about what forms in that child in their first two years?
Wendy Ratcliff  Yeah, absolutely. So. If we think about we think, well, we think about the EYFS, for example, and we think about those educational programs and the primaries of learning. There's so much that needs to happen. What does happen in those first two years and the importance around you know, personal, social and emotional development, physical development, communication and language, we think of those important interactions, and I think one of the key things for us is making sure we get that balance right between care and education, because whatever we do through those interactions, those routines with the youngest children, children are learning something, and that's really important. 
Briony Balsom  Yeah, absolutely. And I think it's because we know it's so important that some of the examples in the report are really so wonderful. So there's a really evocative one of the the practitioner talking about sand in a really glorious way. And you can just feel the engagement with the child. Kiran, I'm going to come to you. Can you tell us a little bit about the methodology and what, what you looked at, who you spoke with to formulate the report? 
Kiran Singh  Yeah, yeah, of course. It was really important for us, right from the outset of this project to capture as many voices as we could and really try to be as accessible as we could for the early years sector. And we know that not every nursery could take part. We know that not every practitioner could tell us something. So we tried to, we did a lot of different methods. We first of all, we looked at existing studies and literature on the topic, and we found that there wasn't really as much as there, you know, that there should be on babies that is specific to England. We also issued a national survey to all local authorities in England, and they then sent on the survey to all their registered providers. So in effect, we were giving every single practitioner in England a chance to respond to the survey. We didn't get every single practitioner respond, but we did get a large number of responses that we could actually use, so that that was really good. We visited nurseries, not ones that were attached to schools, and we also visited child minders, and we interviewed leaders and practitioners, and we held discussions with our own inspectors about the practice that they saw in the baby rooms. So we had a we had a big data set for this, and all of our findings we triangulated across the board. 
Briony Balsom  Yeah, I mean, it's really expansive in the breadth of who you spoke to. So what about findings? What were the key findings? If you could draw those out for us. 
Kiran Singh  We had a range of findings from this research, but they were all really underpinned by the notion that qualifications and experience both matter when it comes to high quality practice and the importance of high quality and relevant CPD for babies. So we saw lots of good examples that demonstrated like, really good understanding of the key person role in the baby room. And it was really endearing and encouraging to see that in the baby room, the baby room practitioners really understood how important this was for the babies. It was really important for them to get to know the baby and to get to know the families. And they understood that they were that link that would make that experience really, you know, really meaningful and good for babies. Our findings also supported that that high that the frequency and the quality of interaction between adults and children are are really critical from that for that quality provision from birth. And whilst I did tell you that our survey was national, it wasn't completely representative of the early years workforce or the wider population of England, and that's an important caveat. But alongside our visits data, it did show us both, both the visits data and their survey data did show us that more needs to be done to help practitioners actually understand their role in babies and toddlers physical development. Exactly what can practitioners do that helps to support them in that physical development. And then our survey also helped us to conclude that practitioners holding qualifications at or above level four, they were more likely to demonstrate a higher level of knowledge and understanding about high quality education and care from from birth than those who held a lower qualification. And we know that might be like a really obvious thing, but it's really important for us to actually see the data that shows us that. And you know, we can talk about that confidently. We also found that when we was talking to practitioners, there were some barriers that prevented, or like delayed, practitioners from actually delivering all those high quality interactions and the high quality education and care that we've talked about a lot in the report for babies. And the main barriers were around, like, misconceptions about educating and caring for babies. And those, those misconceptions were held by practitioners, and we and we know that also that there were some challenges in recruiting and retaining skilled and experienced practitioners that that really did affect, like the quality of baby room practice and leaders talked a lot about that a lot to us. 
Briony Balsom  Yeah, yeah. And I really want to come back and explore some some of the detail in those key findings in a minute, and we can bring those, bring those to life, a little. But to come to you, Fiona, before we go into them in in great detail, so broadly did the report ring true for you in terms of what you know about the sector and practitioners? 
Fiona Bland  It definitely reflects the things that we talk about and hear about through our members. We know that there are fantastic practitioners out there doing wonderful jobs, and it was great to read those lovely examples in the report. And we also hear about the challenges that they're having in terms of recruitment, and, you know, being able to get those high quality staff into the setting. So, yeah. 
Briony Balsom  I mean, I suppose one of the questions that that came to me was looking at the report was about, how do we learn from this? How do we then cascade that into training so that we're improving practice? I mean, continuous development is presumably a particular area of challenge. How can we learn from this and build this into CPD and initial training? 
Fiona Bland  There are lots of challenges, and CPD doesn't always mean formal training. It can take place in many ways, so providers have to be really creative in how they're doing that. If they're looking at a training course, it's thinking about, what are those skills that they want their staff to achieve, what they're looking for them to get, and then making sure that they do some research, looking at the training and the training company making sure that the course that they're looking for has that theory that underpins that practice, and then it gives them that practical application, so that when they go back to their setting, they're able to put that into their practice and see where, where that fits. If it isn't formal training, then you know, CPD can be done through a professional discussion. It can be done through peer observation, and so leaders need to be thinking about finding that person that can actually lead, that who's got the skills and the knowledge to support that practitioner to develop the skills that they've identified that they need. 
Briony Balsom  Yeah, thanks. And presumably, there's something about building it into accepted practice in a setting's baby room as well. How? I don't know how frequently practice in a baby room is reviewed. Is this something that's done on a rolling basis? Fiona, or how does that? How does that work? 
Fiona Bland  Reflective practice should be part of practitioners everyday experience. It's an ongoing process. Quality is a journey, not a destination, and practitioners will be evaluating even without realizing they're doing it when they're thinking about really informal everyday activities and routines and discussions they're having. So what went well in this activity? What might we want to change for next time? When they're adapting plans because babies interested have led into a different direction? So we know that babies and families are unique, so the approach has got to be unique as well, and that comes from looking at your practice, observing it, evaluating it, and thinking about the individual needs of the babies and families that are currently in their care.
Briony Balsom   So going back to these findings, there's some really interesting findings that you mentioned Kiran about physical development. What is it that leaders in the sector can do better to sort of understand their impact on child's physical development. I think it was indeed a third of the survey respondents believe that physical development in babies happens without that adult intervention. Wendy to come to you first, and I'm sure the others will have views as well. What's the issue here? What could be done better and what? What did we learn?
Wendy Ratcliff  Yeah, it's a really interesting one, isn't it? I think there is some ,you know, we know that that good physical development supports children in their playing, in gaining independence, having positive attitudes towards exercise and forming healthy habits and physical health later on in life. But we did observe some disconnect between some practitioners belief and their practice regarding physical development. So for example, some said that they encouraged physical activity, but also that they did not believe they could play a role in supporting physical development. So actually, there's, there's a need there for leaders and the sector as a whole to help practitioners understand that importance in their role in supporting physical development for babies and and for toddlers as well, and actually helping them through that that process. 
Kiran Singh  I will just caveat again that our survey wasn't representative of the EY workforce or the England population at large. However, when we did triangulate that data with our visits, it did corroborate there were, there was, you know, there was enough evidence there to tell us that this is, this is the gist. This is a trend. This is something that is going on in the sector. I think the biggest thing that managers and leaders can do when we did see this is where, where there was that misconception, where there wasn't that, where there was that kind of mismatch between belief and practice. The managers and leaders were actually supporting practitioners to identify that, and they were reviewing that, and they were making them see that, and then they were providing that time and space and supervision for practitioners to actually meet those professional standards. I really liked when Fiona said that it was about them thinking creatively, because actually that when we saw really good practice, that's exactly what we were seeing. They were seeing that it wasn't necessarily that they would be able to buy a course, buy into a course, or do something online. It might be from learning somebody actually who's really, that's their forte, they're really good at that. And pairing them up with them, and having that regular discussion with them might actually just help them to see that we can actually align this, this belief in this practice. So I think that's probably the one of the biggest things that we that we saw, that we that could help to improve that.
Wendy Ratcliff  That modeling and that coaching is, is, is really important, isn't it? And, and there were some, yeah, we did see some examples of, you know, practitioners, modeling and narration. And there were some good examples coming through as well. 
Fiona Bland  I think a really comprehensive induction is really key. You get those new staff into your setting and really being able to talk to them about what your baby room vision and ethos is all about, making sure they understand what an incredible privilege it is to be working and helping develop and shape babies brains. And then that should be followed up with regular support from the baby room leader the rest of the staff in the room should be really good role models, so that you're giving that new practitioner really strong foundation in understanding about the importance of that role and the joy that can be brought from that role too. Any misconceptions need to be addressed straight away, and really helping  this member of staff understand why they're not correct, and giving them ways that they can improve their practice through that new understanding. 
Briony Balsom  Yeah, thanks, Fiona. It's some really practical sort of steps in there. 
Kiran Singh  What Fiona has just said really resonates with our early years workforce blog, because one of the things that we found in that was that it was really important to get that induction right, and the providers that were getting that induction right, were finding that there was less problems as they went on, because it really set that foundation, and like Fiona said, set that belief and set that motivation right from the start. And when you had that really strong induction, you were more likely to get a practitioner that was, you know, more well invested in that. 
Briony Balsom  Just to go back to the key findings, Kiran, you also mentioned that we found that sometimes misconceptions about educating, educating and caring for babies and toddlers could be those barriers to delivering really high quality practice. Can you expand on that a little, and then maybe Fiona and Wendy could come in on how, how leaders can address those barriers?
Kiran Singh  We found sometimes that it's really important for practitioners to actually reflect on how they actually perceive themselves professionally, where we were finding that practitioners only saw themselves as carers, and that there was a range of misconceptions around that, or a range of beliefs around that. So it might be, for example, there was one belief where they felt that parents actually only wanted a caring environment. They wanted, like from a home to a home, or where we found that practitioners only saw themselves as an educator, especially, say, for example, where they were a child minder and they were really, they were really wanted to make sure that the perception wasn't simply that they were child minding in a home. And, you know, they didn't have the same professional standards as a nursery, for example, and they really wanted to make sure that educational perspective was there. We found that that was where there was a bit of lack. It was only when education and care was kind of combined. And actually you have to do both. You need to, you need to be an educated carer or a caring educator, to actually give a baby kind of the absolute you know, getting it right from the start is giving them the best start, is where both things are absolutely held in that perfect balance. 
Briony Balsom  The tightrope between carer and educator and enveloping the two is just incredibly challenging, but that's what you need to deliver results, isn't it? Wendy Fiona, how can this be encouraged by leaders? 
Wendy Ratcliff  I think one of those things there is, is that being able to think about those different those teaching opportunities, and if we think of routine times, for example, a routine time, you know, nappy changing time for a baby, I mean, that's part of their care. But absolutely, isn't that an amazing opportunity to teach those important interactions, that communication and language, singing, rhymes, there's, there's so much that can happen during that routine time that is a educating at the same time, and I think we saw some good examples of that as part of the visits that the inspectors went on. So there was an example where, in one setting, they were talking about carefully sequencing the order in which they do things for babies and toddlers, and how they build on what babies and toddlers already could do. You know that example of helping and showing, teaching babies and toddlers how to hold their spoon at meal times and moving that forward and so thinking about those, that journey that children need to go on and sequencing the curriculum, if you like.
Briony Balsom  Yes, and one of my other favorite examples was around the nappy changing and using vocabulary and talking through what they were doing. Fiona, over to you? 
Fiona Bland  Yeah, I think it's really important that leaders are talking to staff about their responsibilities and their roles, so they're really clear about that they can use supervisions to make that link, as Wendy just talked about, between the care and the learning and and how that's that impacts on on children, and really having those discussions as a staff team, using a staff meeting to talk about that, so that there are no misconceptions. Everybody's understanding is consistent across the setting about the importance of both care and education. 
Kiran Singh  I was just going to say that I actually went on the visit. I assisted on the visit with the with the nappy changing, example. And it was honestly a light bulb moment. And we could, when we talk to the practitioner after, we could really see that she'd got it. And as Fiona was saying, they'd had those open discussions there. There was that consistency. There was that knowing exactly what my role is, that responsibility was really, really clear.
Briony Balsom  One of the, one of the challenges that we pick out in the report is around recruiting and retaining staff and experienced practitioners, and how that directly impacts the quality of education and care for babies and toddlers. I'm going to open this up to everybody, because I'm sure everyone will have a view what, what are the challenges here and what can be done. I mean, we're we're expecting numbers to increase significantly, and so it's something we're going we're going to have to really face head on. 
Wendy Ratcliff  We know that through some of the workforce blog that Kiran referred to this report also draws out that point about recruitment and retention and some of those struggles that settings are facing at the moment. And, you know, there that that kind of pull there as well, that, you know, increasing our youngest children being able to access settings from September and their funded places. So there's lots of pulls out there aren't there in terms of, you know, we need to make sure that, yeah, we're thinking about the practice in the in the baby room, so that we get it right. One of the things that managers, you know, they did tell us that there were high staff turnover, that difficulty in hiring qualified and experienced practitioners playing to the point that Kieran was talking about earlier in the key finding that you know, underpinning all of this report and the research is that it's the experience plus the knowledge and the qualification, where we get practice that is most effective. 
Briony Balsom  Fiona, I'm going to come across to you. 
Fiona Bland  Yeah, we hear from our members about the struggles that they have in terms of recruitment and particularly finding, you know, full and relevant level three qualified staff. We talk to them about being creative in terms of thinking about recruitment and where they're recruiting so that they are are widening their opportunity to find these people. We suggest that they link up with a local college and get in there to talk to people who are just about qualified, talk about the role, talk about the opportunities. So really thinking creatively about how they can do that, and if it, if it's not, then we talk to them about developing their own CPD programs that offer some flexible options so that there's any gaps in staff that they're recruiting they can, you know, support them to develop the skills that they need, and that might be through, you know, reading journals, writing a journal about what's working well and what those challenges might be. It can be things like listening to podcasts and professionals, or it might be a podcast a member of your team. You know, if you haven't got time for those one to one peer observations, getting podcasts recorded that talk about some of those key practice things. Peer observations, in house training, talking through staff meetings or nominating a buddy or a mentor that can really help support the skills that they need.
Briony Balsom  Or by working their way down the list of things you've suggested, because that's a really comprehensive, thorough, yeah, list of really creative, local solutions that people can be taking. Kiran? 
Kiran Singh  I think, as a researcher, what was good for us to see is we had, well, we had a spectrum, and then, you know, there was extremes, and there was providers. Leaders were saying, we have this massive problem. We're finding it difficult to recruit staff. We're recruiting staff that we might not have done five years ago, that we know don't have the experience and qualifications, and then also with retention. You know, we have really good staff, and they've got all of this expertise, but, you know, they're only staying with us for a year and a half or two years and moving on. So for us it was, it was where leaders were saying, we have this major problem, but then on the other hand, and just kind of accepting that there was a problem, but then on the other hand, we were having leaders as as Fiona was saying, they were really kind of thinking quite creatively, and saying, We have a problem, but what exactly can we do about it to ensure that actually, this doesn't impact our babies as much as we can, as much as as possible? What can we do about it to make sure that it doesn't actually impact the the service and the delivery and the the high quality interactions that babies are getting? Leaders were kind of thinking about it in creative ways, and thinking about what they could actually do to kind of minimize as much detriment as much harm as possible. 
Briony Balsom  Yeah. I mean, I'd really like to pick up on that. So from what Fiona said, there's lots of creative solutions to this that do require a lot of thought. There's a real acceptance and recognition of what's coming. But, I mean, how prepared do we feel that providers are for the childcare reforms that are coming? 
Fiona Bland  Yeah, I think lots of providers will already be in the planning stage for increasing the number of babies that they take, and they'll be doing their capacity planning now to look at, you know, budgets, space requirements, qualifications, recruitment, any additional resources and that they might need, and staff training costs for if they need to fill gaps in in staff training. So I think a lot of providers will already be thinking about what we need to do, and they'll be in that capacity planning stage at the moment. 
Wendy Ratcliff  So I think some of that we won't know until we start seeing that through our inspection, our inspection insights will help tell whether or not there's a successful roll out of increased places for children. And importantly, our inspectors will continue to be out there looking at, you know, what's it like to be a child typically in this setting. And hopefully, yes, settings are are getting ready for the change. 
Briony Balsom  Yeah. I mean, it definitely sounds as though these changes are going to require some really thoughtful and responsive practice and leadership. I mean, our report shows that people are well equipped for this. 
Wendy Ratcliff  I think that's really important to say. And actually one of the reasons for producing this report is to think about some of those, knowing those changes are coming, and hoping that this report is accessible for our early years sector, and hopefully they can take some comfort from it and also take some learning from it as well. 
Briony Balsom  Absolutely, well, I can't think of a better place to leave it. Thank you, Kiran, Wendy and Fiona for joining today, and thanks to everyone for listening.
 

Would you like to learn more about our proposed new report cards, or how we’ll inspect inclusion?
Ofsted is consulting on changes to our education inspections. Host Mark Leech (Deputy Director, Communications) speaks to Ofsted’s Chief Inspector Sir Martyn Oliver, Lee Owston (National Director, Education) and Claire Stewart (Deputy Director, Inclusive Education) about our consultation proposals, including our new report cards, inclusion grade and education inspection toolkits.
Take part in our consultation here: https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/improving-the-way-ofsted-inspects-education.
 
Transcript
 
Mark Leech: Hello and welcome to Ofsted Talks. My name is Mark Leech, and today we're going to be talking about the consultation that we're currently running looking at improvements to the way we inspect education. So that's education right from early years right through schools and into further education and skills. And I'm joined by Sir Martyn Oliver, His Majesty's Chief Inspector, Lee Owston, the National Director for Education, and Claire Stewart, who is Deputy Director for Inclusive Education. Our consultation began in February, and it runs until the 28th of April. We're recording this in March so we can reflect a little bit on what we're starting to hear back from the consultation. We've been out meeting lots of people from the sectors that we inspect and regulate, and also meeting with parents groups and others, so we can talk a little bit about feedback and what we're hearing and hopefully answer some of the things that maybe people would like to hear us talk about. So, if I could turn to you Martyn first, just around a bit of the background to what we're trying to achieve here. We obviously had a huge consultation exercise last year, the Big Listen, which has shaped a lot of these proposals. What in a nutshell, are we trying to achieve with the changes we're making to education inspection?
 
Martyn Oliver: Yeah, thanks, Mark, and it's really good to be joined by Lee, and I'm really particularly delighted that we are joined by Claire, because isn't it great that we've now got a Deputy Director who's in charge of just inclusivity, because inclusion is a massive part of our work. And so if I go back to what happened just after I started, I was really clear that I wanted to listen to the system we launched, I think it was last March, the Big Listen, the largest consultation, the largest piece of listening work at Ofsted has ever done. Over 20,000 or so took part in our survey then we had independent surveys looking at parents, what do they think, what providers think, and indeed, children. And in the end, it's about 30,000 people. And they came back with some really strong messages. Some of them are hard for us to hear about a gap in trust. And then some of the messages were really positive about the things that we should do going forward. And some of them were things like, our framework is focusing on the right things currently, with a focus on the curriculum, and that's really important. But our framework is a generic framework across early years, primary, secondary, further education, initial teacher training education, independent schools and people didn't recognise their uniqueness, and so Lee and I were really keen to develop a framework going forward which looked at that uniqueness. We also wanted to pay attention to the context. We heard we weren't spending enough time looking at the context of inspections. The stress and pressure of inspection was a huge part of what we heard. And so, this framework that we're consulting on now isn't just about the actual design of what we will inspect. I think probably even more important than that, to be honest, is how we go about inspecting it. And we've really thought long and hard about that.
 
Mark Leech: Thank you. So, one of the challenges that we have at Ofsted is how we balance the needs of parents with the people that we inspect. So, we hear different things. And you've spoken about the Big Listen, and we heard different things from parents than we heard perhaps, from leaders in schools or in nurseries. And I suppose the area where this really comes together in the proposals that we've put out for consultation is in the way that we report, which is a really big change, isn't it?
 
Martyn Oliver: Oh yeah, the way that we're proposing to report now in 2025 going forwards, will be, I think, probably the biggest change since we were developed back in 1992 because predominantly, we've always relied upon a single word to describe the overall effectiveness of a nursery or a childminder or a school or a college. And we heard this in the Big Listen, but we also heard it from the government when they were elected, was that the single word judgment lacked nuance and complexity of the providers, and it was low information and high stakes and high accountability. We did independent research that I mentioned a few moments ago, and the independent research for providers was very clear: Remove the single word judgment, the overall effectiveness grade, and they talked about replacing it with a narrative describing the strengths of schools or bullet points. And I think it was their third option was to say or show some grades for the sub judgments of areas, but not the overall area. That same research independently carried out on parents said, we want clarity of the grades, but we don't want the single word judgment. And so designing this idea of a report card, dropping that single word grade was to try and lean into the nuance, lean into the complexity, provide written forms of strengths and areas for development that the system’s really clearly asked for, but also provide the clarity on sub judgment and grade that parents asked for, and that's where the idea behind the report card came into. And I get that because it's different, it's going to feel like a big challenge and a big change. I mean, one of the things that I think from my early conversations with people is they're struggling to understand that a provider could be both needing to pay attention to something and be strong at something else. You could be both things across that one institution in different areas. And I think that's right, because if I go back to being a head teacher, and I had quite a few outstanding schools. And even in my outstanding schools, I used to think to myself, yeah, but I know it isn't all outstanding. There are some aspects of it that I'm working on, and the idea of the report card is to try to get underneath that and be of more use.
 
Mark Leech: So I mean, from a parent's point of view as well, I suppose that, you know, they're going to be used to seeing this with their own children, you know, their own children will have things they're really excelling at in other areas where perhaps they're they need a bit more help. So, it's that sort of approach to a school to a nursery to a further education college.
 
Martyn Oliver: Exactly. It's leaning into that complexity and trying our best to help that provider recognise their strengths, recognise what they're working on, or perhaps sometimes point out to them things that they didn't perhaps know about themselves and be of use on that journey. And it's also, I think, really important alongside our consultation, which you can find on our website, gov.uk, the Department of Education is also running a separate consultation, completely independent of ours about how they might use our information to look at accountability on the system. So, there are two types of consultation out there, and I'd encourage people to go and find them both.
 
Mark Leech: Yeah, I think that's really important, isn't it? Because I think people do misunderstand that relationship, even people who work in education, the fact that we are the inspectorate. We go out, we inspect a school, we give a series of grades related to what to what we see. We're not responsible for the next step. So, the next step, be it some sort of support for that school, be it some sort of intervention that sits with government, as you say, there's a separate consultation on that. So, on the new report card, we're going to be using a new grading scale, so it's got five points to it, and it runs from causing concern at the lowest end, attention needed, secure, strong and exemplary. So, people have been talking a lot about these, these five grades. Martyn, perhaps if you and Lee could talk us through what those grades mean and how they'd be applied?
 
Martyn Oliver: Yeah, absolutely. So, the idea is behind the report card, as I said, was to provide more nuanced, more complex information about the wide range of things that providers do, whether you're in a childminder or a nursery or a school or a college. In law, we have to tell the Department for Education if there's an unacceptable standard of education taking place, and so we call that the lowest grade here ‘causing concern’. And if a school or a child model a college falls into that category, that's when we would bring the Department for Education in. And that's why it's important that people look at our consultation, and they also look at the Department for Education's consultation on how they might use our information. So that's the lowest grade causing concern. I'm just going to jump quickly then to ‘secure’. Secure is where we would start all of our inspections at. We would expect everyone to hit the secure standard. It should give parents a great deal of confidence when they see that people are meeting that secure standard. Now, once you've got that secure standard, and you've got that unacceptable standard causing concern, I think it's really important that you've got something in the middle, because if you don't, it's a cliff edge, you're either secure or you fall off and you're unacceptable. And that would be too much pressure on the system. So, I think you need something as a halfway house. It's not an unacceptable standard. It is acceptable. But if you don't pay attention to it, it could be a problem. Now, Lee's got quite a nice way of describing this. Lee, you told me it's a bit like, like an MOT.
 
Lee Owston: Absolutely so in my mind, attention needed, it’s a bit like when you take your car in for an MOT and they'll say, well, Lee, you can certainly drive your car home today, there's nothing fundamentally wrong with it. You can still use it, but actually, unless you kind of take a look at your back left tire and you kind of keep an eye on the wear and tear, the next time you come in for your mot, it's probably going to be unacceptable in terms of the standard that we've set, and that's what we wanted to introduce in terms of between secure and causing concern. Catching settings before they fall, giving them the opportunity to address something before it becomes a major issue, and that's why we came up with attention needed. It's for the attention of leaders within that particular establishment, and of course, it's then up to them to seek the support if they need it, to put whatever aspect of practice that might be.
 
Martyn Oliver: Yeah, and I also think it might be useful for parents, because they might choose to use that information when they go in and talk to their child's school, for example, and say ‘what are you doing about this in your setting?’ and allow the school to explain the actions that they're taking. It should be, I think, helpful for both sides, because I think it's really important that schools work closely with parents, and actually that's one of the things that's in our toolkit that we look at that. So, that gets us then to secure needs attention or attention needed and causing concern. But I don't think that's enough. There's some fantastic performance out there, and if we don't recognise those who are going beyond the secure standard, then that would be a huge, wide range of providers, from those who just made it through to those who are doing something so good that it really is standing out, and that's why we've developed strong or strong practice.
 
Lee Owston: Yeah, and we recognise in lots of the feedback we're already receiving, whether that's through the consultation questionnaire or that's when we're talking directly to leaders, that there's more work for us to do there, certainly to really clarify what is the difference between being secure, doing everything that you need to, in terms of the statutory outcomes and expectations and frameworks, and then strong in terms of going beyond that. And we know there are schools out there that rightly go above and beyond what the kind of expectation or the core standard might be that's been set, and of course, we're working through so what are those features of strong practice that we want to put into our toolkit and very clearly state in our toolkit so people can see the difference between being secure, being strong, what that means and in terms of potential features that may be may be exemplary.
 
Martyn Oliver: Yeah. Now the bit that I found was really exciting about this is Ofsted’s unique role. It should be beholden upon Ofsted to see where we see someone is so strong that something they're doing maybe world class. I mean, I was in a school in the Northwest where I was watching how the school had paid attention to the needs of children with additional needs, whether a special educational needs or they had a vulnerability because they were perhaps a looked after child. Every single teacher had a clear idea of every child and their vulnerability and their disadvantage background in their class. Every single additional adult, a teaching assistant, had that same information. All the leaders had the same information. And the way that those three groups worked together to wrap around these children was absolutely incredible. Some of the best I've seen in 28 years of walking into schools. That would be an example where I would say, that's exemplary, that is incredible. And I think that other schools could learn from that, if that school was willing to share it. And that's where Ofsted, unique role wants to come in in sharing that exemplary practice.
 
Lee Owston: And I would add to that to say, that it's highly unlikely that leaders, settings will be exemplary across the board. And we want to make a very clear distinction, don't we, between how Ofsted and inspection has operated in the past and how we are proposing to operate in the future. So, for example, we don't want people to equate what we do now i.e. outstanding with exemplary. You can't make that kind of leap, or that jump between one system and another, and that's why it's important that we do explain exemplary, because it's about the feature of practice that's exemplary, rather than saying it's an entire aspect or evaluation area within our toolkit.
 
Martyn Oliver: That's also what we heard in the Big Listen. There was a lack of trust that people had in the grades we've given, and so that's why I think this is a really important moment for Ofsted to reset and to rebuild trust, reset its relationship with those that we inspect and develop a new way of reporting, both to parents and to the providers that leans into that nuance, leans into that complexity, which is why we have those areas and why we have those grades. But it's really important that what we're actually asking is nothing new.
 
Mark Leech: So, before we get on to how we inspect and I want to come back to a word that you've dropped in there a couple of times, which is toolkit. So, we'll come back to that, but just to pick up on the report cards, then people will see more grades, so five grades, and they'll certainly see a lot more areas that those grades are applied to. So Lee, do you want to just run through? And I know it's different if you're if you're a nursery to a school to a college to a apprenticeship provider, but what sort of things are we looking at?
 
Lee Owston: So you'll of course see lots of things that you're very familiar with. In fact, there shouldn't be anything in our toolkit that you think, oh, that's brand new. I've never heard of that before, with the exception of inclusion, and I think Claire will come in later and talk about inclusion. But for example, you will see leadership and governance, that leaders and governors are responsible for taking forward the high-quality education and care for the children and the learners in their particular community. You'll see in there, curriculum, what is it that we want children and learners to be working through in terms of their program of study. Teaching is in there. We've importantly called it developing teaching, because it's about how leaders are offering support and development to their staff, so they can be the absolute best in terms of what they deliver for children and young people. You'll see in their behaviour, attendance, personal development, so lots of things that we already know and are familiar with. However, the important difference is that we've separated them out so that no longer aggregated into one overarching judgment, but actually we've disaggregated them. We've separated them out into their constituent parts, because it's important that we're able to evaluate and grade all of the great things that leaders are doing. And let's celebrate that success where it exists, and an awful lot of it exists. But also, let's use the opportunity of inspection to reassure leaders that whatever they've got on their desk today, whatever priorities they're working through, that actually they're the right ones. They've got the right actions in place, and even if they're not seeing the finished article yet, that we can say, but you're going in the right direction, and there are some green shoots. And then the other function of inspection, linked to what we were describing earlier, around attention needed, is that with fresh eyes, as an independent person visiting a college or a school or a nursery, I can say, and look, you might just want to turn your attention to these things next. They're not on your radar today, but I think they should be in the future, because if you don't, they're probably going to be a concern when we come back in 4,5,6 years time, depending on the remit. So, in terms of how we work through inspection, it's important to see all of the proposals as one big package, because ultimately, it's about how it all fits together, not only what we look at, but as I'm really passionate about how inspection feels. When I or my inspectors come out and visit leaders in their settings, what does it feel like and that interaction, that conversation, and that dialog, and we've got a range of measures in our proposals that I encourage everybody to look at, because it is about seeing all of it together so that we can change the culture and make inspection the best it possibly can be.
 
Mark Leech: I want to bring Claire in because we heard a bit there about inclusion. It is a new thing that we're focusing on through the inspection. It will get a standalone grade of its own. It's been something that people have been talking about in the education sector and discussing how this is going to work. So, Claire, what light can you shed on first of all, what we mean by inclusion, and I know there's been some work done talking to various people in the sector who are experts in this field, to help define what we should be looking at. And then how we inspect it and how we apply that.
 
Claire Stewart: It's a really tricky question, isn't it, what do we mean by inclusion? And you'll see in our consultation that we've got a working definition, and we've used that to help us inform our work through the toolkits on inclusion and that grade. And we're really keen to hear people's views on that working definition. What we're really looking for, though, is that providers and settings know their students, they know their pupils, they understand what barriers they might be facing to education. Disadvantage and vulnerability isn't a fixed state, is it? You know, pupils can move in and out of being vulnerable, and it's about how leaders can show us that they understand their pupils and that they're able to try and meet their needs and remove some of those barriers, and, of course, how they support those students with SEND (special educational needs and/or disabilities) as well. So, I think that's really, really important. I'm really excited that we've got this standalone grade on inclusion. I think that really shows just how important it is for everyone at Ofsted and for the wider education sector. It's really really important. I'm also really excited that if you look at the toolkits, it's actually throughout a lot of those other grades as well. So we're thinking about how inclusive is the curriculum, how inclusive is the teaching, what are the behaviour policies like, and how do we meet the needs of some of those really vulnerable, disadvantaged children, those students that might have SEND and also thinking about how providers also think about those really highly able pupils as well, and how they meet their needs.
 
Mark Leech: It is quite broad in that sense, isn't it? It is really looking at pupils from different sorts of backgrounds, pupils with different levels of ability and how they are included.
 
Martyn Oliver: So I was really keen to see inclusion be at the heart of it. And look, it's early days, but I was talking to a very senior person representing the work of local authorities, and they were saying that, since we've started talking about inclusion the last 13-14 months, if you get it right for the most vulnerable and disadvantaged, you get it right for everyone. This very senior person said, since you've been talking about inclusion, we're noticing the system suddenly opening more resource bases. We're noticing changes in admissions. Makes you realise how important it is that we get this right, because the intended consequence of what Ofsted does is so impactful, just as the unintended consequences. And that's why we're doing a consultation because we don't want to have an unintended consequences. And we definitely do want to have those intended consequences that will raise standards and improve the lives, especially of the most vulnerable.
 
Mark Leech: No, definitely. And talking about what we're seeing a bit of in the consultation, and I'll bring Claire back in, perhaps, on this is a bit of concern around around the inclusion grade that to take schools as the sort of example here that schools might be sort of penalised for failures in the wider SEND system. So, for a long time, people have spoken about the SEND system being under enormous strain. It's often described as a broken system. I think it's really important talking about those unintended consequences that we don't end up with schools sort of carrying the can for wider problems in the in the system. So, Claire, can you talk a little bit about that and perhaps reassure some of the listeners about how we'll go about looking at SEND within that area of inclusion?
 
Claire Stewart: Absolutely, there's a lot of positivity in what we're seeing initially in the consultation responses around that focus on inclusion, it is so important, and it's something that parents are really keen on, but absolutely recognise the kind of concerns that schools will have. What we are really looking for is that schools know and understand the needs of their pupils and how they try to lower those barriers to learning for those pupils, whatever they might be. We understand the context of those schools that they're sitting in, we do hear about the wider SEND system, and we understand the challenges there. So, we're not expecting schools to kind of do things that are totally outside of their control. What we are wanting to see is that teachers and leaders understand their pupils and that they are trying to mitigate those barriers as much as they can with the resources that they've got.
 
Mark Leech: I think that's really helpful to hear. So we've talked a lot about the different grades and the different areas that we're going to be looking at and, once or twice we've mentioned toolkits, so we should really get on to some of some of that area now, which is more about how we are proposing to inspect from November this year, so that's when we're looking to bring these changes in. Lee, do you want to talk a little bit about what these toolkits are, and a bit more as you alluded to earlier, around the feel of inspection, and what we're trying to do there. It's one of the areas that has come up a lot in the kind of debate that's been going on about Ofsted, about how head teachers and leaders in nurseries and further education colleges, how they feel when they're being inspected.
 
Lee Owston: Yeah, that that term toolkit, we've chosen that term. Look, we might not stick with it depends what people tell us as part of the part of the consultation, but it is a word we're using to describe a set of materials that are as helpful and supportive as possible in terms of continuous improvement. And yes, we'll be using them at the point of inspection to support an evaluation and a grade, but we would hope that leaders, wherever they are in the education system, would be able to use those same materials to support whatever it is that they have to do next in their day-to-day work. And in doing that, we've been very conscious to craft each toolkit, and there's one for each remit that we inspect and or regulate – so, registered early years, state funded schools, non-association, independent schools, further education and skills and initial teacher education – so, we've tried to make sure that we speak directly to those different remits. We've crafted them all around the statutory. guidance and the professional frameworks that exist within each of those remits. So, to give you an example, our registered early years toolkit is crafted around the EYFS, the Early Years Foundation Stage, the statutory document the government have set as the expectation in terms of what all registered early years settings should be doing. So, this is not about Ofsted telling people what they should do. I want to be able to come in as an inspector and evaluate how well you are following through on all of the things that you're expected to do that has been set by government. And in schools, we have things like ‘Keeping children safe in education’, we have teacher standards, we have the special educational needs code of practice. And of course, in colleges, we have the 16 to 19 study programme guidance, we have apprenticeship standards. So, every remit to varying degrees has a core set of materials set by government that lay out the expectations of how they're supposed to work. Inspection will just key into those and, as we described earlier, the secure column, that middle column in the toolkit, is really carefully crafted against those statutory expectations and professional frameworks. It's deliberately more detailed in that middle column, because we've tried to capture all of the guidance that exists. So, we hope that when people look at the toolkit, they will recognize that it isn't anything other than what they would usually be expected to work within. The other challenge was to make them as crystal clear and as accessible as possible. I recognise that sometimes we can all look, as it currently exists, one bullet point, let's just say, under ‘good’ currently, and because they're written in such high level language, and there's such a summary of lots of things that we can all come to understand and interpret them in different ways, and that's where we can get lots of criticism about inconsistency because are we all looking at the same thing and understanding it in the same way? So, I want to reassure people that, yes, the toolkits do look like there is more. But what I really tried to do is take out of my mind, as the principal inspector for the organisation, the thought processes that I go through, and try to put them in everyday language onto the page so that nothing is hidden, nothing is secret, everybody is well aware of the steps that we go through and the expectations that we have linked to, as I said, that statutory guidance and those professional frameworks. Now there's more work for us to do, because I'm pretty sure there'll be bits of it, bits of the toolkits, standards that we could be even sharper at describing. But I think the message about not being additional or other and making it as accessible as possible is certainly the right direction that we should be going in.
 
Martyn Oliver: We launched a consultation, we said openly that we know that strong needs to be better defined. And we could have run all sorts of test visits out in the sector for months and then launched the consultation, but I was determined, and again, it's a part of the Big Listen to be open and transparent, and that's why we didn't do that. We made sure that the system knows that there won't be any clandestine testing taking place. We'll be out there openly and transparently saying we're now out in schools or out in early years, out in colleges, testing. And that's why we expect to see that bit get better. And so, in the consultation responses, I'd really love it if people came back with supported definitions to how to strengthen, strong. I think that'd be great. And the other part of behind the toolkit now, we do not want people to go writing self-evaluation form. We don't want that. If there's nine areas we're looking at, we don't want head teachers to produce nine ring box files of evidence, but we do know that the best leaders will evaluate, self-evaluate where they stand. And because the toolkits are written against those professional standards, and if anyone hasn't done this, if people are listening to this and they're a teacher or a parent of a child in a school, just pop onto the internet and have a look at professional standards to be a teacher. The day that you qualified from initial teacher education to become a qualified teacher. It's got two parts, part A and part B. Look at part A in particular. There's an awful lot in there about delivering high quality curriculum, high quality assessment, supporting children to achieve well. Once you read that language, then look at our toolkit. You'll see where it's coming from. And I've had messages already from an executive head, who runs a large group of schools in the north of England, not my old one that I used to run, I quickly hasten to add, and they said that they're finding the toolkit so helpful because they're evaluating their school and they're now leaning into what we've already put in our draft to help them be as sharp as they can, about the great elements that make up great provision, and that's where the tool comes in.
 
Mark Leech: We’ve heard an awful lot. We've talked about grades, we've talked about the evaluation areas, we've talked about the toolkits and how the inspections will work. Talked about inclusion, which has been really helpful. I think we could probably talk for a lot longer. I think I'm going to suggest to people listening that they go to our website, gov.uk/Ofsted, where you can read all of the proposals and take part in the consultation. We genuinely want to hear back from people out there, from parents in particular. We want to hear back from people who are working in the sector. We want to hear back about the sort of big picture, but also some of the details. Are we getting the wording right in the toolkit, are we explaining ourselves clearly enough in the report card, so lots and lots of areas for people to feedback on. You have until the 28th of April. So, it just leaves me to thank Sir Martyn, Lee and Claire for joining me today, and thank you all for listening.

What's the picture of local areas and how well they are working to prepare children and young people with special educational needs for adulthood? What support are they offering to allow young people to reach their full potential? Preparation for adulthood arrangements in local areas: a thematic review - GOV.UK
 
Briony Balsom  0:07  Hello everyone, and welcome to this edition of Ofsted talks. I'm Briony Balsam, and this time we're focusing on preparing for adulthood. In December 24 Ofsted and the Care Quality Commission jointly published a report considering how well children with special needs and or disabilities or send are being supported in their preparation for adulthood. We considered survey responses from more than 2000 children, young people, parents and practitioners, and visited six local area partnerships to explore how children and young people with SEND are being prepared for adulthood. Later, I'm going to be chatting to Jess Taylor Byrne from the CQC, who jointly produced the report with us. But today, firstly, I'm delighted to be joined by guests from Newcastle College. We spoke to practitioners and leaders at Newcastle as part of our visit, and we found some really positive practice in this area. So joining us, we have Rachel Gibson, who's the Assistant Director at Newcastle College. We have Maxine Johnson, who is the SEND manager, Sabarina Logan, who's currently studying for a level three National Diploma in Business at Newcastle college. And also we have Adams Sproston, who is Ofsted senior HMI for SEND. Hello everybody!  To kick us off, I'd really love to hear from you, Adam, about what innovative ideas we came across that are really working at this really key juncture of a young person's life? 
Adam Sproston  1:29  Thanks, Briony.  We found lots of positives across the six areas that we visited, typically, professionals in education, health and social care, working in very challenging contexts to meet the needs of children and young people, and they shared with us challenges in the economy, but also after COVID 19 and the impact that that's having on some young people. In particular, we found that providers that give high quality careers, information, education, advice and guidance are able to prepare young people better for adult life. May that be courses that they move to, careers that they want to be interested and and thrive in, or in other aspects. So for some young people with SEND that might be improving their independence or supported living as they become an adult. So that was really important to see where professionals know children and young people really well. They can be best placed to meet their needs and tailor their approaches to work for the child's aspirations.
Briony Balsom  2:36  Wonderful. So let's come across to Newcastle and hear a little more about exactly what it is that you're you're doing so well. 
Maxine Johnson  2:42  So within our support offer within Newcastle college for our learners with with high needs, so we have a dedicated team of SEND advisors who support our learners with HCPs, transition into college and transitioning with the school, the provider that they're currently with, liaison with any external providers to ensure that we can obviously meet their learners needs and support that kind of smooth transition in a college before they've even started, whether that's coming in on transition visits and doing tastes within the curriculum, or seeing the learners and doing observations in the classroom to see how their learning works and how this how they supported to again, make that transition as smooth as possible. We also do as part of our transition, we have a summer school within our life skills hub, which again, just cements and kind of builds those foundations for our students to be able to know the campus, become familiar with certain spaces that they may access when they're here, which again supports that transition into into college. So we have a dedicated team that specifically work with our learners. With HCPs, in terms of the wider offer. We do have an access hub as well, so that is again, supporting our more complex learners. For us, it's about making our curriculum as inclusive as possible. We have an incredible Assistive Technology Team, and I hope you kind of get from the way that we talk about this, the offer. It's about promoting independence, giving students the tools, strategies to be able to take that to the next level, whether that's the next program of study for us as well, we're lucky. We have a higher education provision here, which a lot of our students aspire to progress on to. We've got, obviously, apprenticeships, supported internships or employment. So it's about how we support the students to be able towards that independence. It's about those independent skills being able to be once you've let College, be able to access and be a well rounded citizen.
So much to unpack all day, which is fabulous, and you're clearly so passionate about it. Listen, I'm itching to come to Sabarina and talk, because this is potentially a really exciting time, a time of big decisions as you work out next steps, whether you want to work go into further study. How does that feel?
Sabarina Logan  4:55  Feels amazing, but also like quite nerve wracking. And obviously, I'm in my final year of college, and this September, I'm going to be coming back to the uni here, just because I'm so familiar with the support that I get, and I just feel quite comfortable. So I know what's where I can get help, and I know my way around. So yeah, it's, it's going to be a big step. I'm going to do business and a degree, which will be three years. So I'm looking forward to it. 
Rachel Gibson  5:29  You know, we don't just focus on the qualification and the life skills club in particular, do a lot of work around independent living skills on a on a social level, as well as a sort of teacher, student or staff student level as well. And all of those sorts of opportunities are really important. And they might seem like really small things to other people, but actually at an individual level, all of those small things, a small thing to me, might be a huge thing for another, for a student, and from having two or three conversations with Sabarina about a couple of other things and more about Sabarina just from having that conversation with us. So what we'll get, what the students get from each other as well, through the through the sort of dedicated hub approach that we have.
Briony Balsom  6:11  Adam,  can I come across to you and just see whether that is the kind of thing that we've seen replicated in other places, or is that something that Newcastle college have that's fairly unique?
Adam Sproston  6:20  We did. We did see that approach in in many settings that we visited the differences about knowing the children, seems obvious saying it doesn't it, but when you know your children well, you're more able to flex resources and also to meet their needs in a more bespoke way. Something else that we found commonly was, of course, when those relationships are built, it also supports a sense of belonging, and actually that students may stay longer and sustain educational outcomes, or those life skills outcomes that you discuss there, I wanted to pick up also something that we did find at Newcastle, the links to families as well as to the students.
Maxine Johnson  7:02  We are trying to incorporate even things like independent travel training with that as well, which I know for a local authorities, is a huge kind of thing with with send transport. So we're using those individual life goals and life skills. Is of being able to access public transport is absolutely huge. So even in incorporating things like that into the work that we're doing with our special school is so important. Already, the students came in last week for the very first time, and it was an absolute pleasure to have them on site, and a lot of them did incredibly well. And we were all asking how it went, and a lot of them were saying, can't wait to go home and tell parents. And for us, that's the main thing that they're going home and telling their families they feel safe. And they really enjoyed the experience, so that they will continue to kind of come in again, become familiar with the setting, become familiar with how we are as a as a college to again, support the students, if, hopefully one day, if we can meet the needs that they they may end up coming and studying here, which is, which would be an absolute pleasure.
Rachel Gibson  7:57  I think, as well at a wider level. So we also have a lot of young people with with additional needs who don't have an HCP. So our teams are present at every open event. We're present throughout the whole of enrollment. We have a dedicated support hub in our main library, so it's very accessible, and we know a lot of parents will come along with their students at the on the enrollment and open events and where we will talk to parents at those events and talking about the support we can offer if a student wants to come and meet us, but wants the parent there, or the parent feels they need to be there to ensure that we get all of the information, then we're quite happy to do all of that. Those relationships with parents are absolutely key in terms of ensuring a really strong and positive experience for our students.
Briony Balsom  8:38  That's wonderful to hear. I mean, I was going to ask about potential barriers, or perceived barriers. Adam, is there anything you'd want to add to that, in terms of barriers that we've seen, we saw elsewhere in the in the work?
Adam Sproston  8:50  you've explained it so clearly, Newcastle, there's a open, open events, where you can show off what you what you offer, and we found those in some other areas. But actually, sometimes parents don't know what's around the corner. You use the word college straight away, they're thinking several buildings, 1000s of students and and how will, how will their child fit into that setting? So we did find stronger impact in areas that do bring all providers together so that it's in an open way, shown to parents and carers what is on offer you touch there on transport as well, and in some areas that we visited, that is a significant challenge, be it the distance some young people are expected to travel, or that the travel may not be suitable, Or again, that parents feel it could be unsafe, for example. So great to see all of that work that's going on to take parents on the journey with you as well.
Briony Balsom  9:49  So obviously, we've heard about like a veritable buffet of support that's on offer at Newcastle College. For you personally, what's been the most helpful and useful support? That you've received in sort of working out what what you're doing next. Just
Sabarina Logan  10:04  Basically would, I would have like reviews with my SEND advisor, and we'll just have a little catch up with how lessons have been going. What are my future plans? And also, I would have a one to one session with my main business tutor, so they'll have it all up to date on their system, which we call E tracker, where they have what my goals are, what I've achieved, what I personally think I've achieved, or what I want to improve next. We have in business, I must say we do write a lot in lessons today, around three to four pages, and I can't lie, my  hands do ache when we have to write loads of notes because there's a lot of content to absorb and take notes down. Sometimes I can't keep up, so I'll have my one to one with me, and what she will do is they will write the missing notes and basically like a revision tool for me to use if have any upcoming exams. Now, I did have an exam last Friday, which was Principles of Management. It was three and three and a half hour exam, I must say, was very stressful, so I just gave my best shot, because that's all you can do. Absolutely. 
Rachel, it must be really satisfying as leader to see that direct line of sight between your aspirations?
Rachel Gibson  11:26  We're part of a college group, so it's, you know, we've been graded as good again. I think what Maxine and I share as sort of central support managers is that we're always looking for ways to improve, but I think it at a senior level. I think it's really important that there is a senior level buy in. And we're really lucky here that we've got our previous principal and our current principal are really absolutely 100% behind what we do, and have a very, very focused on young people. So I've been part of our center executive group with the Newcastle City Council for a number of years now, and represent the post 16 voice, which is often missing, I think it at that level. And and the local authority have really embraced that and involved us. So we, you know, we sit on various partnerships, you know, our assistant principals on the children and families board. We, you know, we're part of getting, getting it right together, work stream and the PREPARING FOR ADULTHOOD work streams. But I think internally as well, around three years ago, I became part of the senior leadership team at the college, which I think has made a massive improvement in terms of the visibility of some of the issues that you know, and in our report on on our work weekly now to all of the senior leadership team, so there's real transparency. And when, when Sabarina talks about support, I think it's for me, it's not just about it. I mean, the support practitioners learn, support practitioners who support Sabrina are incredibly important as but it's also about what the teachers do and and the work experience coaches, and it's about how I'm the life skills hub, and it's about how all of those people work together. And I think you need to have the buy in at the top level to get things moving. And we're always looking for improvement. And on a slightly different note, but one of my team is is a governor on the board of the virtual school at Newcastle, and as a result of that, and and the really, really sort of focused work we've done over the last five or six years around care experienced students has led to it them investing in a two year post with us, and specifically around transition of looked after children, you know, so for us to see, say, the confidence that The local authority have in us as an institution, and the reputation that we have, and the fact that our numbers are increasing, our high needs numbers have increased another 2020, this year. You know, we're sort of going up and up and up, I think, demonstrates the reputation that the college has now and the confidence that the local authority and have have us have in us as a post 16 provider. 
Adam Sproston  14:02  And I would agree with your point where what we heard in the other areas that we visited is actually post 16 for quite a while has come a bit later down the line, and it's now that areas are thinking, we really need sufficient numbers of high quality placements. And in some areas there's, there's a dearth of those. There's not, not enough places to go around. So brilliant to hear about that growth there. I chipped in actually at the point where you mentioned children and young people with SEND who were in care or a care experienced. And that was a real positive across the areas that those children, they have additional oversight, and that, typically there are, there are deals done to ensure that those children get high quality support from education placements. But it's brilliant to hear about that buy in, and that isn't the case everywhere, and I think that places are having to think increasingly outside the box in terms of what they're going to be able to put in place for growing numbers of children and young people that may need very, very different support packages or might just need a little bit of extra help to access a mainstream college curriculum. 
Briony Balsom  15:19  We set out in the report that strategic leadership and that link to local authorities is really important to avoid a sort of cliff edge at 18. Can you just say a little about why, why we said that, and why we think that? 
Adam Sproston  15:32   It's really important that local area partners, when we talk about partners, we're talking about education, health and social care. Colleagues are well sighted on the children that they are responsible for, and we can see today here that we have excellent careers guidance. Children can have their eyes on the prize as to what they want to work towards. But too often, we did find that the discussions for moving towards further education. There's not really a set date when that happens. Colleagues are nodding today here, some schools will start things at different dates. In some of the stronger areas that we visited, there was a buy in in that partnership, so all of the schools would start it on a certain date. Now we wouldn't have a preferred date because, of course, some children, you may need to think about their needs earlier than others, but we we did find that it was a bit hit and miss as to whether or not children would receive a robust package of support that planned out next steps, where that worked better. There was a strategy that children, focusing on those with education, health care plans, and those who were in care or a care experienced, that there would be their plans of action would be put into place earlier than than others, and that they would work towards identifying where might be suitable placements and engaging with those further education providers to see if everybody agreed that the package of support that goes in to supporting that young person would likely benefit them or not. We did find actually that in more rural areas that there isn't that connectivity around services because of the distance between possibly providers of further education or specialist support, those areas did tend to have more challenges, or reported more challenges to us, and that links to a point that colleagues raised earlier transport. Children might have been educated at their local secondary school, and they may want a specific course now, it might not be on offer at the local college, and so they need to go a little bit further away to meet their aspirations some areas that we visited, for example, cities. So we're talking to Newcastle that actually there was almost a perception that those areas it was much easier to meet children's needs as they move towards adulthood. Now actually, that's a bit of a double sided problem that we have, and that's because while there might be more things available. We did hear from college leaders and professionals at the partnership that the turnover of staff and actually recruiting the right staff can be more of a difficulty because you're in that city, locality, there's more opportunities for people to further their career. 
We started running some open events for prospective staff to who wanted to work in support. So not just SEND support, but who might want be interested in library jobs, admin jobs. And as a result, we recruited about seven or eight staff from that, didn't we? So we ran it again and again. Got so every time we run it, we get it. So our our vacancy numbers are smaller now than there have been. And the other thing we've we've done, which, we're really proud of, is we sort of partnered with with another local authority and their apprenticeship provision to recruit teaching assistant level three teaching assistant apprenticeships. So we've currently got four who are about three or about two to do their end point assessment, who hopefully will all then go into permanent pools. For those, that's what we would hope. And we're going through another recruitment phase, because it's for us to be able to get level three apprenticeships in and almost sort of grow your own approach, really. But we also think we can we always look for progression. You know, for you know, we are talent managing our our new staff, from almost on the minute the walk in a lot of our wider leadership team and within central support services started off as support staff, so they've got a real understanding. And as a result of that, we, we as a service, have got really positive scores from our. Up around and well being work life balance, and also how supportive line managers are, which is a massive part of of retaining good staff.
Briony Balsom  20:09  Thanks, Rachel. It's really interesting to hear how something that Adam spotted at a national level is sort of is manifesting in your in your in your particular college. Um, Adam, I know you want to leap back to health. Let's loop back to health. I think
Adam Sproston  20:20  It's, I think one of the main challenges is that there are different times that the rules say different things should happen at and so if you're a young person who has health input, we did find that certain things stop when you become an adult, because you're 18, even though you're being supported by the college, and actually, parents don't understand this, not hasn't been explained to them because they've fought and won an EHC plan, which on the front of many of them say things like this, will carry on until you're 25 so, so that's a bit of a missed messaging that we did find in many areas, some areas, they just don't have a like for like adult service. So you may need some sort of speech and language advice as a young person, you might be working on social communication skills, but then that service ends when you turn 18, and there isn't a like for like adult service and other services as well. So that was a difficulty that we identified. And the same applies for young people who might need support from cams to support their mental health and emotional well being that they may be on waiting lists for a very long time, and while they're on that waiting list because they turn 17, 1819, wherever the cutoff is for that area that they then may need to rejoin another waiting list as as they become an adult. So that's something that we found that was a common difficulty. The report makes recommendations to the sector, Department for Education, Department of Health and Social Care, for example, one of them is around supported internships. The difficulty with them is, and this, again, is, is the rules that apply. You need to have an education, health care plan to start on a supported internship. But actually, your plan will likely come to an end if you're successful on that so again, chiming with colleagues at Newcastle college, it's parents that often need to have that explained to them that the output might be a job for that young person. Other ones are around making sure that there's consistency to preparation for adulthood in children's education, health and care plans. At the moment, each local authority is responsible for their education health care plan template, and that can look very differently. And you know, young people like Sabarina, what? What do you want? Is that in the plan? Is it clear? And does everybody know about it? And I actually know that colleagues in the room know you really well. So in quite a lot of the time, we found that staff that support children, one to one are actually working against paperwork that's sometimes outdated or doesn't match what they know children and young people want. And also, another one of the recommendations was was around increasing the amount of high quality and specialist residential and supported living accommodation for those young people who who need that. .
Briony Balsom  23:33  It's been really fascinating to have a chat with you all today. Really heartening to hear about some wonderful practice. And I think all that remains is for me to say a massive thank you to Rachel, Maxine, Sabarina and Adam for joining us today.
 I'm now joined by Jess Taylor-Beirne, who is Children's Services operations manager at the Care Quality Commission, or the CQC, with whom Ofsted worked jointly on the reports just to set the scene. Jess, why was it that we worked together on this report?
Jess Taylor-Beirne  24:07  Area SEND inspections are done jointly with CQC and Ofsted. So CQC look at the health side of things, and Ofsted looking at education and care as well. We're really fortunate that CQC and Ofsted have worked on many inspection programs together, and so we have those established links. The area SEND programs, joint targeted area inspections, and these thematic SENDs as well. So we know how important it is to approach these with a variety of lenses and see the child's experience from many angles. So CQC, we look at the health side of things, but with an awareness of how that impacts on education and care. And Ofsted do the same from from their side. And we're fortunate all of our inspectors get to bring their own expertise different frames of reference to create that shared understanding. And so we then therefore have the shared aims for children and young people alongside our Ofsted colleagues, and we know that the outcomes for children and people with SEND are far better when health services, education and care are all linked up and contributing. So it's really important for us as different inspectorates to reflect that as well and create that joined up working, which I think we do well.
Briony Balsom  25:10  Specifically when it comes to health services, what is the role of those services when it comes to this period of transition into adulthood? 
Jess Taylor-Beirne  28:19  Sometimes it's easier to think of what it shouldn't be. But I think what we've seen from these inspections is that regardless of need, it needs to be individualized for that child or young person, and their health outcomes need to be considered alongside educational goals and their care or support needs. These conversations around that young person's ambition, their family's ambitions for them and their plans, it needs to happen earlier. Families need to know what to expect, and children, young people, need to be able to express their views on it as well. Enabling independence from a young age is so important, it starts with those life skills to whatever level depending on that child's need. But that ambition and planning needs to be there from really from really young, what does the future look like for this child, and how are we supporting that and and that's where universal services such as health visiting, school nurses can be so important at that early stage, even if adulthood feels a long way off.  I also think it's important to note that certain diagnoses for children as they transition is really important. We know that there are long waits, especially at that transition point, because often you go into adult services and then have to go to the bottom of the waiting list, as much as we have a more of a needs led approach within children's services that they can access everything they need to, in adults, often things do still rely on a diagnosis, for example, a diagnosis of learning disability or autism. So ensuring that those diagnoses are there as that young person transitions is really key, and was one of our recommendations. The other thing I'd just like to add is about equity across services. We can't have services dropping off at 16 with no adult equivalent, but sometimes until the age of 18. So there's often a couple of years which which parents describe as a cliff edge of not having that that care their child needs. So improving this and ensuring that health services are linked, are really key at that transition, and when that happens, results in far better health provision for those children and young people.
Briony Balsom  30:49  Listen it's been really heartening to listen to you all today and to hear about some wonderful practise. All that remains is for me to say a massive thankyou. 

Ofsted's report into multi-agency responses to serious youth violence: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/multi-agency-responses-to-serious-youth-violence-working-together-to-support-and-protect-children
Safer London's report: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/children-and-families-experiences-of-multi-agency-support-when-impacted-by-serious-youth-violence
https://saferlondon.org.uk/
 
Briony Balsom  Hello everyone, and welcome to this edition of Ofsted Talks. I'm Briony Balsam, and this time, we're focusing on serious youth violence and our recently released joint report. We released a joint targeted area inspection report, which we call a JTAI, on serious youth violence on the 20th of November, that report had a lengthy title for a weighty subject. It was called 'Multi agency responses to serious youth violence, working  together to support and protect children'.   Later in the podcast we'll be joined by Carly Adams Elias from Safer London, where she's director of practice, to talk about their work around serious youth violence, but first to explore with reports and findings, we're joined by some of those who contributed to it. We have Helen Davis, who's head of thematic and joint inspection at His Majesty's Inspectorate of Probation. Ade Solarin,  the inspection lead for child protection at His Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire and Rescue services. Hello everyone. Jess Taylor Byrne, who is the Children's Services operations manager at the Care Quality Commission. Hi there. Hi everyone. And Wendy Ghaffar, who is Ofsted specialist advisor on cross remit safeguarding. Wendy, if I could come to you first so we can say a little bit about the scale of the problem. Many might assume it's a city issue, but is that really the case? 
Wendy Ghaffar  No, it's definitely not the case. It's not just a city problem. I think we were shocked as a group of inspectorates to find that in all of the areas we visited, there were many children, including children as young as 11, carrying knives for their own protection. And in some of the areas, and for some children, it was absolutely the norm to carry a knife, often, not always, but often that was what children saw as a way of protecting themselves. And if you look at our report, at the beginning of that report, we talk about a very young teenage boy who was chased by a group of older teenagers in his local area, and he knew that those teenagers were carrying knives, and so he started carrying a knife because he saw that as the only way to protect himself. And we heard about children who were too frightened to leave their own homes, children not attending school because they were so fearful. And this is happening in small towns, out in the countryside, and we think that social media plays a role as well. If we look at the work of the youth endowment fund, they surveyed 7500 children last year, and one in four of those children had either been a victim of violence or perpetrated violence, and children also spoke about seeing real life episodes of violence on social media so they might see something that's happened in their locality on social media, and that's feeding into this sense of fear. And we don't think that adults are really sufficiently aware of this problem. And the other thing that came through is the impact that this has not just on children who are directly involved, but on their brothers and sisters, on their friends, on communities, on schools. So there's a kind of ripple effect when there's an incident and it's impacting on children's general well being, their sense of safety. I think we also need to think about the links there are with county lines and criminal exploitation. So some of this, not all of it, is happening in that context of county lines, which, as I'm sure people are aware, often organized crime gangs are forcing children to carry drugs out into the countryside, into smaller towns, and very often forcing children to carry knives. There's some groups of children who are particularly badly effective or more vulnerable, and that includes children with special educational needs and some children from some particular ethnic groups, and particularly with children who've got special educational needs. We know that nationally, there are delays in those children getting assessments, and delays in them getting the support they need, and we think this is actually putting them at increased risk of serious youth violence.
Briony Balsom  Thanks, Wendy and you mentioned the wider community impacts as well. I wonder whether anyone would like to come in and talk talk to that a little?
Wendy Ghaffar  We saw some very strong examples of where voluntary organizations were kind of harnessing, if you like, capacity within local communities to protect children, to offer other opportunities for children, to provide a venue for children and families, to provide different opportunities for children and families. But we also heard when we went out into those communities, the impact. That serious youth violence had on local communities, particularly on parents, how worried they were about their children, that it was affecting all sort of age ranges within the community, not just children. So it has a sort of really widespread impact. We also heard from schools as well, because we went out to schools, we talk to education leaders about the impact, and this is clearly an issue that they're having to address as well. 
Briony Balsom  Jess, did the inspection look at everyone's input and the difference that they especially can make? 
Jess Taylor-Beirne  The government has set out the serious violence duty, so which means local area partners all need to work together in these joint targeted area inspections, we really look at how all of those agencies work together. So what's it like to be a child in that area and have all of those different professionals working with you? So we saw children's social care, police, various education settings, Youth Justice Services with probation. We saw lots of different services, including the ambulance emergency department, some universal health services, sexual health services, and of course, like Wendy said, we saw the volunteering community sector as well. And whilst we found some really good work happening in some areas, it wasn't happening everywhere. As an example, one area didn't have a focus at all on serious youth violence as a major concern, and so many of the frontline staff across all of those agencies, hadn't had as much training or support to be able to identify those children at risk of harm. They just didn't know what to look out for and weren't able to recognize the signs that someone might be exploited or impacted by serious youth violence. The strongest work was when senior leaders at the top of organizations, they all understood that serious youth violence had to be a priority in that area. And it wasn't just one person's responsibility or one agency. It was collectively a priority for them all. And in those areas, they were gathering lots of data and information about what was occurring in their local area, and that's what filtered down to the practitioners, and that's when we saw that really good and innovative practice at times, multi agency training, information sharing, professional curiosity and really thorough assessments of children impacted by serious youth violence by all practitioners, there was a much better shared understanding of the experiences of those children, and within those areas, they were actively consulting with children and Families and the wider communities to find out about experiences, what support did they need, what did they want? So they very much understood the local issues. They were really creative with their roles, for example, embedding Speech and Language Therapists. And within Youth Justice Services, there was some really tenacious individual work with children, such as in social care. But like Wendy said, as well, with the community resources, that was where we saw some really interesting work and really impressive work. An example is, I think a couple of areas had their community services linking with the ambulance, and so they were promoting and training on the use of bleed kits, basic first aid, so if, if a young person or anyone was seriously harmed as a result of serious youth violence, the immediate medical attention would lead to much better outcomes for those children and others. Were giving children opportunities to help them develop skills to divert them away from those exploiting them. But I think most importantly, with those projects you know, so many of these children had really complex life experiences. Lots were outside of mainstream school. Lots had scnd, and where those professionals all worked together, they were very much understanding the impact of trauma on a child's experience. They were understanding the impact of abuse as well. And we'd see practitioners all working together on the ground as well. So for example, utilizing psychologists in the youth justice services to really create a good case formulation for that young person. So there was really creative use of practitioners already there, and that communication between them all just just led to much better outcomes. Where that happened
Briony Balsom  Ade, did you want to come in on that? 
Ade Solarin  What we didn't always see was evaluation of some of those approaches to just get a sense from from the area of the local partnerships just how well they understood what was working well and what evaluation that they had considered. So it's really, it's really, really important that local partnerships do do more evaluate approaches to addressing serious youth violence and and use some of the available research that's out there, some of the learning that's out there, and also learn from each other as well as local partners. We did see a level of some inconsistencies in terms of approaches, but we also understand that some areas have some more committed funding. Some areas have have more resources. So so yeah, so we were sometimes seeing in some parts of the country was established what's called balance reduction units, and the utilization of those units and some of the funding that comes with that. Some of the other areas that didn't have the VRUs, as they're called, just meant that they had less resources. And also some that we did, one in particular that had, that did have a VRU just wasn't using it well, so there were some inconsistent approaches and practices across the country.
Briony Balsom  Yeah, thank you. Helen?
Helen Davies  Yes, just to say that the value of multi agency work was really underlined by what we saw in youth justice services in a number of areas. So Youth Justice teams are multi agency teams in themselves. So they already have a police officer, they already have social workers in the team, they have a probation officer, they have health workers. And to be able to respond swiftly, because you've got the right people in the team that made all the difference. I think the other important thing in terms of response was was that youth justice team has both the justice response and, importantly, the safeguarding response. So yes, once allocated somebody in the youth justice team, they were able to lead in, in many cases, a multi agency meeting and to get all the relevant agencies together, and what's called a formulation meeting, which is picked up earlier, but seem to be quite effective. And there are some good examples in the report.
Briony Balsom  Yeah. So the theme seems to be this kind of multi agency approach, being able to bring a holistic view, a more holistic view, to the subject. Wendy.
Wendy Ghaffar  So the multi agency approach isn't just about addressing knife crime, although that's a very important element of it. It's about meeting all of the range of needs of that child and often of their family as well, if the family is in need of support. And what our report is highlighting is that you have to address all of those needs. You can't look at this in a siloed way, and the importance of recognizing the safeguarding needs of these children is essential. And another important element, and another important sort of partner, if you like, is education. So we saw some really good work with partners working together to support children back into mainstream education, but that has to be done in a very kind of skilled way, and all of the partners working together, and it's only through that multi agency approach that you can address all of those needs and hopefully prevent any further harm to any other children. 
Briony Balsom  Ade, I'm going to come to you now, just to kick us off on what happens when agencies don't work so well together, and what impact that can have. 
Ade Solarin  What we often saw was just a failure by partner agencies to consistently identify serious youth violence as and see it as a safeguarding issue. And I think where partners are looking at trying to respond to the, say, violence, elements of serious youth violence, and taking, perhaps a siloedapproach and trying to tackle the issue because of the headline of serious youth violence, you're not addressing, or at least trying to address or understand some of the other underlying factors for for some of those children, many of those children often have special education needs and disabilities, often termed SEND, and other risk factors as well. So I think what we saw, especially from the police, for example, was just inconsistent approach in terms of recognizing some of the risk factors, recognizing some of the risk posed to children, and once, when you don't recognize that risk initially, it means that there's limited understanding and limited capturing of that information, and then that means what you're then sharing with your partners. And what we saw in the inspection is what was then shared with partners was also limited. 
Jess Taylor-Beirne  There were some areas where they were very much focused on children being in crisis, rather than trying to preempt it as well. And we saw some really good practice when children were in crisis, like Helen has said, once they're in youth justice, they could access a huge range of resources. But that earlier approach to identifying need more of a public health approach wasn't consistent everywhere, and again, where it was, there were much, much more positive outcomes.
Helen Davies  If it's not recognized as a safeguarding issue, and we found this in particular for some black children, and a process of adultification where their needs as children weren't prioritized. So some some comments, more generally as well, that we heard were about children placing themselves at risk, as opposed to children being exploited. And some children are more vulnerable to that than others, children with special education needs, for example, so when you don't recognize that, that there's a risk, that some of the language around it starts to locate the problem with the child placing themselves at risk, as opposed of they are being exploited.
Wendy Ghaffar  Yeah, there were a couple of couple of examples that really stood out. For me, one was ambulance staff, and I think to some extent, in one of the emergency departments in the hospitals where professionals weren't asking children about what had happened to them, they weren't showing curiosity, they weren't showing that care that those children really needed, which meant those children weren't accessing the support that they needed. And I don't know Ade, do you want to mention about custody suites? Because I think we saw really different kind of responses from the police in custody suites, depending on where children were. 
Ade Solarin  Yes, thank you. Wendy, yeah, we did. We did see some different responses, especially when you look at custody. Custody is a place where a child who's been arrested for some form of exploitation, for example. And custody isn't always a pleasant place for the child, but we have seen that some areas who have invested in training, trauma informed training, really, we did see some benefits for children where the officers demonstrated that understanding and recognized some of the risks that some of the children would have been exposed to, and in one particular area, because of the level of training that those officers had received, we saw some really good responses to that child, and also it just really highlights the importance of joint working, because obviously they meant that the police forces and their they were thinking about some of the actions that they needed to take whilst the child is in their care and custody, liaising with partners in the youth justice service, liaison with partners in children's social care so that there is a holistic package of care for the child when the child is eventually released from custody.
Jess Taylor-Beirne  That language that you would see in in reports, and then you'd be having discussions with practitioners, and it would come out that they didn't realize that that child did have additional needs and needed to respond in a different way. And so that was very, very telling throughout the inspection, that we were the ones to to be picking up on those things and bring practitioners through that and in the areas where it didn't work well, it was very, very sad hearing about a lot of those experiences, of those children that hadn't had the support they needed, and very vulnerable children in custody suites without the support that they needed, or accessing health services without being seen as as a child as they were.
Wendy Ghaffar  So I think, as we've described, once children got into the system, particularly if they if they got service from the Youth Justice team that enabled them to have access to the kinds of assessment they needed, and also often the kinds of supports they needed? If their speech and language needs were identified at a much, much earlier age, you know, very early on in primary school, for example, then it's going to be much easier for those children to engage in education. And potentially, their kind of outcomes in life might be might be different. It might not be as simple as simple as that, but that's just one example, I guess, where if children were receiving the assessments early enough and their support early enough, then at least there may be a way of preventing some of these problems arising so they're not getting to 13, 14, 15 before their special educational needs, and particular things like their speech and language needs are being addressed. Because in some ways, that's too late for these children.
Briony Balsom  Yeah, and what's coming across really clearly, and you've all spoken very clearly about the multitude of ways in which the system could, just could do things better. It's not all going wrong all the time, but there are lots of different things, the lack of curiosity about local context, lack of curiosity about child situation, the failure to recognize vulnerability as a result of that, the inconsistency and often siloed approach. Helen, can I come to you, if these things are going wrong, what is the report calling for?
Helen Davies  So we're calling for serious youth violence to be prioritized in all local areas and to recognize that this is happening across England. We looked at England, no doubt happening across Wales as well, and that need to work together to support those that are affected, but also to prevent further serious youth violence and to support communities as well and to protect communities. So it's really important. Guidance from government would help, just to steer partners, I think, now, on how to work together to help children they're experiencing harm from outside the home. So partners are more used to focusing on protecting children within the home. On this topic important to look beyond, to look at how children are experiencing harm outside of the home.
Briony Balsom  So before we say goodbye to you all, I would love to come back to Wendy to reflect on some of the really excellent practice that you did see. On the day type?
Wendy Ghaffar  Yeah, I think, I think the message we'd like to leave with everybody is that multi agency working can work in terms of addressing and preventing serious youth violence. It can make a real positive and significant difference for children and communities. We saw some fantastic examples, both in terms of individual work with children and families, but also in terms of some of the projects that are out there in communities and really opening up opportunities for children, we saw some really effective work, as we've mentioned, between the police and local communities and between children social care and local communities. So we feel very positive that if partnerships prioritize this, if they really understand the issue of serious youth violence and the impact it's having on children, then further good work can be done. But at the moment, we know this isn't happening for all children across all of England, and that's where we need to drive improvement
Briony Balsom  Wendy, you're going to stay with us. And joining us is Carly Adams Elias from Safer London, where she's the director of practice. Safer London works with and advocates on behalf of children and families who've been impacted by violence and exploitation. We've been really delighted to work with Safer London, who've entirely independently from the inspectorates, brought together their report called Who Cares, which explores the direct experiences of children and families on our behalf and to inform our work like the joint report who cares came out in mid November, and it takes a really detailed and compelling look at children's experiences of serious youth violence and what help and support is available to them. The children who took part in the consultation were different from the children and families involved in the JTAI inspections, and the majority lived in different areas to those we inspected. The inspections and the consultation work are quite separate, but do focus on the same issues of multi agency work to address serious youth violence. Carly, is the issue of serious youth violence getting worse?
Carly Adams Elias  The UK has seen increasing evidence of the scale and impact of serious youth violence over the past decade. The report highlights that numbers of children who've lost their lives to violence is higher than it was 10 years ago. For context, London recorded its worst ever annual death toll of teenage murders, with 30 young people killed in 2021 and that's similar for the number of young people admitted to hospital for knife assaults, which has increased by 47% in the last 10 years. We also know that issues such as poverty, mental ill health, childhood experiences of abuse and harm and other forms of trauma increase the risk to serious youth violence. And what I would say is that the landscape around these issues is changing, and we're seeing the impact of things like budget cuts and austerity that have an impact on the way that services that are available to support children and young people function. Thresholds are quite high, and opportunities to engage with children and young people often come after harm has happened, rather than earlier opportunities. We're also kind of in a position where we're only really, I would say, starting to see serious youth violence as a safeguarding issue across the sector, and so I think that will obviously have an impact on the data and the numbers of people that are coming into contact with services. And so I think whilst there are improvements, there's still a long way to go in terms of really understanding the scale of the issue.
Briony Balsom  Yeah, and what's our understanding of what the drivers are for this violence in the first place? I mean, it's a it's an easy sounding question with I'm I'm imagining an incredibly complex response!
Carly Adams Elias  Things such as kind of racism, poverty, ableism, that are all kind of woven into our our systems and kind of exacerbate the experiences of children and young people and families who may become vulnerable to violence as a result of some of these issues, some of the social conditions, in the context where children and young people and families are living their lives, whether that's kind of local communities, in schools or online spaces. 
Briony Balsom  Thanks. I mean, there's a massive breadth there of intervention and change. What particularly are Safer London doing in response?
Speaker 8  we mainly work individually with children and families. We provide one to one support to children and young people that have been impacted by exploitation and violence. And our approach is to really make sure that we're taking kind of a Relational Approach, which really centers trust and building trust with children and young people and their families, and that we really understand the individual complex experiences of trauma, whether that's their physical safety or their emotional safety, but also their relational safety and kind of the safety that they might experience in different relationships and different contexts of their lives. You know, we really try and position our work from a place of being person centered, non judgmental, making sure that we're working at the pace that works for that particular child or young person. Is there any capacity for us to support change within the context where that young person might be being harmed? For us, it's really important to try and work with a whole family, because we're aware that issues like violence and exploitation don't just impact the young person when they experience harm, but it impacts the whole family and wider communities such as their peer groups and other social networks are the ones that are going to have much longer term sustainable relationships with them. So we think it's really important that we try and invest in those and try and help create safety in those so that the young person has a longer term level of support. And what we often see is that young people's presentation of trauma responses are often seen as behavioral issues in the way that they engage with others, how they're able to kind of function and participate in their education, how they're able to hold and maintain relationships, their ability to kind of seek help, kind of help that they've received when they're first experiencing issues. So whether they've shared something with someone and not believe that's then going to have an impact on how they're able to trust if they're, you know, coming into contact with a police officer that maybe they're feeling unsafe with in that interaction, then they're going to be less likely to be able to maybe share their experiences. But that will then also have an impact on how they're able to recover from those harmful and traumatic experiences. 
Briony Balsom  That feeling that children were sometimes being blamed for the harm they experience.
Carly Adams Elias  And sadly, that isn't then just limited to the way that the young person is talked about. That's going to have an individual impact for that young person who might feel quite labeled by the adults or professionals that are kind of talking in that manner, but it also has a significant impact in terms of how decisions are made for that young person, what kind of support that young person gets. It might impact on that young person being further marginalized, excluded from school. It might mean that they're more likely to become engaged with the criminal justice system, rather than agencies that are in place to kind of prioritize and take forward, kind of safeguarding measures. 
Wendy Ghaffar  It makes me think about some of the responses children got from the ambulance service, and particularly in emergency departments in hospitals. So for some children, where the staff have been trained, they've got the support. They understand the issues. They're asking, the right questions. They have a sort of caring, appropriate response to children, and like Carly said, that can open the door then to support for them in the longer term, for support for their family, and importantly, support for their siblings. And I think also the responses children get in school is really important. And again, we went to one area where education were very much seen as part of the partnership in responding to children and in preventing serious youth violence. Staff were trained. They knew what signs to look for. They knew how to talk to children about these issues. 
Briony Balsom  Importantly, you worked with a group of children and young people and parents to co create the report. So they were at the very heart of it. 
Carly Adams Elias  I just want to take a moment to thank the children and the families that participated, because I was actually quite overwhelmed by how much they did share. And you you'll see in the report that they're, you know, we we've included as much as we can in terms of direct quotes. What they were really asking for is improved communication and clearer communication. And they were really clear that they wanted to be able to be involved in that decision making. They were really clear that they wanted communication to be empathetic and compassionate. They wanted a safeguarding response, which was something that they didn't always feel. That they had some children and families that spoke to us, they said, you know, that that looked like real, tangible, practical, helpful intervention. So that might be things like, the whole family is experiencing threats of violence, that then has often quite significant impacts on their ability to feel safe in their own home. And a lot of the children and families that we were talking to had real difficulties in securing safe housing. But actually, you know, when they had multi agency professionals that were working together to achieve real, tangible changes, like achieving safety in their home environment, that that felt like it was a helpful level of intervention. It was often also in relation to kind of their individual needs, such as kind of having their neuro diversity properly assessed and understood and responded to. You know, we spoke. To some young people that felt like their neuro diversity was seen as a problem and it wasn't something that was supported or honored, particularly in education, and that might then mean that they were moved from one education provision to another, and then that created more kind of uncertainty and change for them at a period when actually what they really needed was those sort of consistent relationships and having their basic needs met in a place where they felt safe and familiar.
Briony Balsom  And presumably promisingly, there is a significant crossover between what they're asking for and what we're hearing from them and what we know works? 
Carly Adams Elias  There are definitely lots of examples of good practice going on. And what we were hearing from children and young people was that when organizations were engaging with them in a way where their needs were centered, where their voice was centered and heard, where they had opportunities to kind of build relationship and connection, and that support was offered in a way that was compassionate and empathetic, that that means that you've you've kind of providing a bit of a solid basis there for kind of further interactions. And if you can build on those kind of foundations, you really kind of have centered that Relational Approach. And we do know that through speaking to children and young people that they did receive that in some context with some organizations, we heard from young people that really spoke highly of support that they received through youth service and voluntary sector services. So yeah, it is available, and it does exist, perhaps not yet on the scale that we would like it for the children and young people. 
Briony Balsom  Carly, a massive thanks for joining us and thanks to everyone who's listening. You'll find the Safer London report alongside our own report on the gov.uk website. We'll put the links into the transcript for the podcast so that you can check it out. Thanks to everyone who joined us today, and thank you for listening.