News
Summer activities in Islington
Islington Council and partners are coming together again to offer a range of activities for all ages, including the Bright Start (Early Years) and Bright Futures (over fives) Summer Programmes, Holiday Activities with Food, Adventure Playgrounds and Summerversity.
Islington Council’s Holiday Activities and Food (HAF) programme
We have asked schools to ensure the following information has been provided to their school community, in particular families whose children are eligible for our targeted holiday programme offering free activities and lunch during the summer holidays.
This year we have also just released a video to encourage participation – recommended viewing! Thursday 25 July to Friday 30 August 2024
There are many exciting activities happening across Islington as part of our holiday programme. From football, tennis, archery and kayaking to dance, music, theatre, art and cooking – as well as trips – there is something for everyone.
Free places are available to young Islington residents from 4 to16 years (up to 18 years for children with SEND) who receive benefits-related free school meals or can be referred by a social or family support worker or other professional.
Activities must be pre booked via our central booking system.
Bright Futures Summer Programme
Bright Futures offers a full programme over the summer period, running activities, trips and advice drop-ins across the borough in community venues and outdoor spaces, in partnership with Bright Start. Activities are available to all families living in Islington, with families who have children from 5 to 19 years.
Please download and share the programme: Bright Futures Summer Timetable 2024
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Note: this document is designed for print only and should not be shared on your websites or through any electronic newsletters
For sessions which require booking, please follow booking instructions on timetable
For further information, please contact Teresa Connolly/Amanda Sexton/Gullu Cicek.
Bright Start Summer Programme
A broad range of free activities for families with children aged under 5 is on offer, including stay and plays, health services, sessions at libraries and family support, with a big emphasis on being outdoors.
HR update
If governors would like training on HR matters, please contact SchoolsHR. The training will be free to governing boards buying into the Schools HR SLA. For other schools there is likely to be a charge.
Sessions available:
- Teachers Appraisal (including role of pay committees and appeals process)
- Governors’ role in HR casework (Investigations, Hearings and Appeals)
Harjit Roopray, Schools HR Consultant
Keeping Children Safe in Education, updated for 2024
The 2024 edition of Keeping Children Safe in Education (KCSIE) is currently a draft version, and will take effect from 1 September 2024. This update introduces a few, primarily technical changes, aligning more closely with the Working Together to Safeguard Children 2023 guidance. Further changes will take place in 2025.
Part 1 – Safeguarding Information for all Staff
Page 4 – the definition of safeguarding now reflects the extended definition contained in Working together to safeguard children 2023. Ensure all policies including the Safeguarding and Child Protection Policy, refer to this new definition (updates in bold text):
- Providing help and support to meet the needs of children as soon as problems emerge
- Protecting children from maltreatment, whether that is within or outside the home, including online
- Preventing the impairment of children’s mental and physical health or development
- Ensuring that children grow up in circumstances consistent with the provision of safe and effective care
- Taking action to enable all children to have the best outcomes.
Paragraph 18 contains the extended indicators of early help, again revised to align with Working Together:
- is showing signs of being drawn in to anti-social or criminal behaviour, including gang involvement and association with organised crime groups or county lines
- has experienced multiple suspensions, is at risk of being permanently excluded from schools, colleges and in Alternative Provision or a Pupil Referral Unit
- is at risk of modern slavery, trafficking, sexual and/or criminal exploitation
- Is frequently missing/goes missing’ now includes ‘from education, home or care’.
Paragraph 19 focuses on abuse and neglect as well as exploitation.
Paragraph 24 the indicators of abuse and neglect refer to the impact of children seeing, hearing or experiencing the effects of domestic abuse by the addition of the words ‘including where they see, hear or experience its effects’.
Paragraph 29 - under ‘Safeguarding Issues’ instead of ‘deliberately missing education’, it refers to, “unexplainable and/or persistent absences from education” which aligns more with the language used in Working together to improve school attendance.
Part 2- the Management of Safeguarding
Paragraph 92 includes a reference to the Data Protection Act and the UK GDPR to comply with requirements.
Paragraph 171 – there is an emphasis and clarification that schools remain responsible for pupils they place in alternative provision.
Paragraph 179 acknowledges that not all home-educated children have a positive learning experience and decisions to home educate should be made with children’s best education at heart. It also acknowledges that home-educated children are less visible to the services that are there to keep them safe and supported in line with their needs.
Paragraph 200 refers to the non-statutory guidance on Promoting the education of children with a social worker and children in kinship care arrangements which was updated in March 2024 and extended the role of Virtual School Heads to include championing attendance, attainment and progress of children in kinship care arrangements from September 2024.
Paragraph 204 now includes two NSPCC links, https://learning.nspcc.org.uk/safeguarding-child-protection-schools/safeguarding-children-with-special-educational-needs-and-disabilities-send and https://learning.nspcc.org.uk/safeguarding-child-protection/deaf-and-disabled-children#risk-and-vulnerability-factors
Paragraphs 205 to 209 have been re-titled ‘Children who are Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual or Gender Questioning’ and some language has been changed. The term ‘bi’ is replaced with ‘bisexual’ and the term ‘trans’ has been removed. The section is under review pending the outcome of the gender questioning children guidance consultation.
Paragraph 206 makes reference to the Cass review which identified that caution is necessary for children questioning their gender as there remain many unknowns about the impact of social transition and children may well have wider vulnerabilities, including having complex mental health and psychosocial needs, and in some cases additional diagnoses of autism spectrum disorder and/or attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.
Paragraph 207 recommends that where families/carers are making decisions about support for gender questioning children, they should be encouraged to seek clinical help and advice.
Paragraph 208 states that when supporting a gender questioning child, schools should take a cautious approach and consider the broad range of their individual needs, in partnership with the child’s parents (other than in the exceptionally rare circumstances where involving parents would constitute a significant risk of harm to the child), including any clinical advice that is available and how to address wider vulnerabilities such as the risk of bullying.
The term ‘provide a safe space’ has been replaced with ‘create a culture where they can speak out or share their concerns with members of staff’.
There have been no changes to parts 3 and 4 of the guidance.
Part 5 Child-on-Child Sexual Violence and Sexual Harassment
Paragraph 497 is now aligned with Working Together to Safeguard Children so ‘providing support as soon as a problem emerges, at any point in a child’s life’ is replaced with ‘support for children of all ages that improves a family’s resilience and outcomes or reduces the chance of a problem getting worse”.
Page 151 includes, ‘have been the victim, perpetrator or alleged perpetrator of serious violence (e.g. knife crime)’ as another indicator of Child Criminal Exploitation and Child Sexual Exploitation.
Annex B Further Information
Page 156 Preventing Radicalisation – this section remains under review since the publication of the new definition of Extremism on 14 March 2024. You need to be aware of the new definition although it is not included in the draft guidance:
Extremism is the promotion or advancement of an ideology based on violence, hatred or intolerance, that aims to:
- negate or destroy the fundamental rights and freedoms of others; or
- undermine, overturn or replace the UK’s system of liberal parliamentary democracy and democratic rights; or
- intentionally create a permissive environment for others to achieve the results in (1) or (2).
Annex C – Role of the Designated Safeguarding Lead (DSL)
The final bullet point in the section on holding and sharing information has been updated to include that the DSL should keep written records of all concerns, discussions and decisions, including the rationale for those decisions. This should include instances where referrals were or were not made to another agency such as LA children’s social care or the Prevent program.
The DfE has kept to its commitment to only introduce technical changes for 2024 but, as with any change, there are things that need to be done in terms of updating policies and procedures, including the Safeguarding and Child Protection Policy, Prevent, Information Sharing, Child-on-Child Abuse procedures and Children Missing Education. Staff need to be updated and so does training and development to ensure they have the knowledge and understanding about the changes.
Contact Soola Georgiou.
Global Majority Governors Network (GMGN)
GMGN 2024-25 meeting dates, all 6 to 8pm with light refreshments:
- Wednesday 23 October 2024, at Camden Education Offices, 5 Pancras Square
- Thursday 27 February 2025, at St Luke’s Community Centre, Islington (venue tbc)
- Wednesday 11 June 2025, at Camden Education Offices, 5 Pancras Square
The network provides a safe space to share the highs and lows of being a governor or trustee from the Global Majority. There’s lots of sharing of experiences.
To book a place, please apply on GovernorHub or, if you don’t use GovernorHub, please email Governor Services. For the October meeting, please book by 9am Monday 21 October.
Governance survey from National Governance Association (NGA)
The NGA has just published its annual school and trust governance survey.
Here are some headlines:
- Over 3,000 respondents
- Budget pressures – 60% of respondents cited the budget as their top challenge (up from 40% in 2020). In addition, 59% of respondents reported that budget constraints were impacting on the breadth and quality of the curriculum.
- Access to funding was the top SEND challenge – reported by 74% of governing boards (66% in 2023).
- Falling pupil numbers – 39% of respondents said their finances had been impacted by this. There was also concern about the impact of falling rolls in the near future in other schools – 45% in primary, 23% in secondary.
- Support for families – 51% of respondents said their school had increased the additional support offered to pupils and their families in the past year.
- Attendance was a high priority.
- Safeguarding – 49% of respondents reported an increase in safeguarding concerns in the past 12 months, with bullying, neglect and domestic abuse topping the list.
- Governance still has an age and ethnicity problem. The proportion of respondents aged 60 and over reached its highest level since the survey began. The report suggests that 52% of governors are now 60 and above, while 9% are under 40 and just 1% under 30. This potentially means a significant under-representation of younger perspectives. Of those responding who disclosed their ethnicity, 95% identified as white, “underscoring the stubborn lack of ethnic diversity in governance roles and the risk that boards are often not reflective of the communities they serve”. We hope that the Islington Governors Diversity Survey due to take place in the autumn term 2024 will show a more diverse picture of governance in Islington.
Support to Governors
Governors’ briefing survey and date of next meeting
In April, we asked governors to respond to some questions about governors’ briefings in a short online survey in order to ensure briefings are as useful as possible and to increase attendance. We had 17 responses. The full findings of the survey will be shared at the next Governors’ Briefing. Some initial headlines:
- Attendees of briefings appreciate being updated on Islington plans/approaches as well as those of other schools, and learning about things that are new.
- Generally, the reason for people not attending is other commitments and lack of time.
- Topics governors most want covered at briefings are:
- School Organisation (12 votes)
- SEND (11 votes)
- General governance updates (10 votes)
- Pupil Attendance, Finance and Safeguarding (nine votes)
- In relation to the format of governor briefings, 11 wanted all meetings to be online, six online except face to face in summer.
The next Governors’ Briefing will be held on Thursday 19 September, 6 to 7.30pm, MS Teams.
The agenda will include:
- Update from Jon Abbey, Corporate Director Children’s Services
- Introduction to Paul Senior, Interim Director of Learning and Achievement
- Results Overview 2024
- Islington Professional Partners (IPPs) and Support for School Leaders in the coming year
Please book your place on GovernorHub or if you don’t use GovernorHub, email Governor Services stating your name and Board.
Governor training 2024-25
Bookings are open for sessions in the central Governor Training Programme for 2024 to 2025. The programme will be published soon.
Autumn term 2024 (online) courses:
We are looking at the suggestions for other topics raised in the Governors’ Survey and hope to advise shortly of some additional sessions during 2024-25.
Governor training is on our training platform, My Learning. Instructions on how to register and book are in our Governor training programme summer 2024.
If you have any suggestions for areas of governance you would like covered, please contact Jane Wright, Manager for Schools and Early Childhood Governance.
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