Message from Cllr Suzy Horton, Cabinet Member for Education
Dear colleagues
Welcome back to the start of a new academic year. I hope you all managed a good break and thank you all for your hard work last year. I am really looking forward to continuing to work with you in 2019/20 and hope to carry on and visit as many schools as possible over the coming months.
Many of you will have seen the letter from Alison Jeffery, Director of Children, Families and Education, that was sent out to all schools yesterday. You can access a copy of the letter here.
Finally, I'd like to say a big thank you to Philippa Wilson who has diligently been pulling together the PEP bulletin, and before that the Schools Bulletin, over many years. This responsibility is now transferring to Justine Stretton as part of an increased resource by the council to support the work of the Portsmouth Education Partnership in terms of campaigns, events and communications that will include the PEP bulletin, the PEP website and campaigns such as Teach Portsmouth and School Attendance.
In the meantime, I wish you all a productive and hopefully enjoyable year.
Cllr Suzy Horton
School Improvement |
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 Improving reading will be an important focus for many schools in Portsmouth in the coming academic year. School improvement funding is being released to support your school to carry out their own bespoke reading projects based on proven research and principles from the Challenge the Gap and SEN projects.
Portsmouth Teaching School Alliance are launching this project in partnership with Portsmouth City Council and with support from Thornden Research School and the EEF. This will enable your school to have access to the most up-to-date research and resources and ensure that the projects you undertake will be successful.
The project will have a full day launch on 3 October at the Training & Learning Centre, Cowper Road, followed by a series of four bespoke workshops during the year. Through school improvement funding, SLEs will be trained and deployed to support and advise your school with their reading project in schools and they will be part of the launch day and the workshops.
The only cost to you is £100 per participant to help towards covering room bookings and specialist trainers.
This is an extremely exciting project that could change reading practice not only in Portsmouth but throughout the country.
Sign up here to secure your school’s place.
Emotional health & wellbeing |
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 Training completed by new ELSAs
Congratulations to all 11 newly qualified ELSAs (Emotional Literacy Support Assistants) who have completed their 5 day training schedule successfully!
ELSAs receive training on various aspects of emotional literacy including emotional awareness, self-esteem, anger management, social and friendship skills, social communication difficulties and loss, bereavement and family break-up issues. They are taught specific techniques such as active listening, writing social stories to help children understand social routines and facilitating Circle of Friends intervention.
Training is carried out once a year by PCC Educational Psychologists. The next training schedule starts in February 2020 and incorporates 5 separate training days. Once ELSAs have completed the training schedule there is a further commitment to attend supervision sessions (6 over an academic year) to maintain their ELSA status.
If you are interested in putting forward a member of your staff to train as an ELSA please contact Philippa Wilson who can add you to the waiting list for the February training.
World Suicide Prevention Day
This falls on Tuesday 10 September. There are various resources available to help schools talk to students about mental health. Time to Change have resources to create an open supportive culture around mental health, Young Minds have resources around self-harm and Rise Above offer resources on topics including stress, bullying and dealing with change, which could all affect young people's mental wellbeing. You can also find details of mental health services and support for young people, their parents and professionals working with young people on the Portsmouth City Council mental wellbeing page.
Scroll Free September |
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The Royal Society for Public Health has launched a campaign called Scroll Free September, encouraging people to take a break from personal social media accounts for the month. With 1 in 5 young people waking in the night to check social media and 7 in 10 experiencing cyber bullying you might want to encourage pupils in your school to give it a go. The idea is that by going scroll free for a month, people will have a chance to reflect on their usage - what they missed, what they didn’t and what they got to do instead. Find out more about the campaign and sign up for a lesson plan.
Healthcare & Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists - Abortion Facsheet (February 2019)
The FSRH and the RCOG launched a free Abortion Factsheet resource to support teachers with relationships and sex education lessons in secondary schools in the UK. Endorsed by PHE, the Sex Education Forum and PSHE Association, it provides accurate, up-to-date information about abortion and abortion care in the UK. Click here to view the resource and follow this link to read the blog post.
 Triple P Primary & Teen Discussion Group dates for next Term from the Parenting Service.
Free online epilepsy guide
Young Epilepsy has just launched a free online guide for schools on supporting young people with epilepsy.
The guide includes information on seizure first aid, epilepsy’s impact on learning and behaviour and the key elements of support that should be in place at school, and template documents, including a policy on supporting pupils with medical conditions, an Individual Healthcare Plan (IHP) and a seizure record form.
The guide also features Young Epilepsy’s ABLE tool (Assessment of Behaviour and Learning in Epilepsy). This is a simple questionnaire for staff and parents to use to identify potential areas of concern.
Simon Says...... |
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Simon Says - the child bereavement support organisation - offer a network support group which meets termly at Craneswater Junior School. For more information and contact details see the flyer.
They are also holding their first ever bereavement conference on 22 November 2019 - information and booking details here.
Special education needs and/or disabilities (SEND) |
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The summer term SENCO Newsletter is now available. This includes dates for the Network Meetings and Training sessions.
The SENCO Induction session is for any SENCO who is new to the role, new to the city or is experienced and would like a refresher.
If you would like to attend or send someone to these sessions please let Sarah Christopher know.
SENCO Network Meetings will continue to be held at Stamshaw Junior School:
Refreshments from 1.15 for a 1:45 start on the following dates:
Next meetings :
Thursday 14th November
Wednesday 4th March
Tuesday 9th June
New SENCO Induction: Monday 23rd September 2-5pm
Civic Offices, Conference Room B
Welcome to the new LADO, Hayley Cowmeadow
Hayley Cowmeadow is the new LADO for Portsmouth. Her role is the oversight and management of cases where it is alleged that a person working with children has;
- behaved in a way that has harmed a child, or may have harmed a child;
- possibly committed a criminal offence against or related to a child; or
- behaved towards a child or children in a way that indicates he or she would pose a risk of harm to children.
Please note that all allegations / concerns should be reported within 1 day of you being made aware and a reminder also of transferrable risk cases where a circumstance in a person's private life may call their suitability into question (including matters of concern relating to the wellbeing of their own children) etc.
Also of note is the need for decisions regarding potential risk posed by those working with children, should not be taken in isolation (WT 2018) but jointly by yourself and the LADO to ensure all areas of safeguarding are considered. So if you have any situations where an investigation is being carried out or being considered as a result of a person's conduct towards children, please complete the notification form within the specified 24 hours.
You can contact Hayley by email or ring 02392 882500 if you need to have a discussion about whether a situation meets threshold for LADO intervention. Hayley is more than happy to chat it through or provide any advice and guidance when assessing risk or safety planning if needed.
Keeping children safe in education
A briefing has been issued with key updates to the statutory draft guidance for schools in England on keeping children safe in education - issued July 2019.
PCC Secure Email
If a school receives an email from a secure account within PCC, they can respond to that email and it will remain secure. PCC secure accounts replace GCSX or Proofpoint accounts. This also works in reverse so that if a school wishes to send a confidential email to someone within PCC and they know that the recipient has a secure email account i.e., joe.bloggs@secure.portsmouthcc.gov.uk the whole email will remain secure.
Preparing for Brexit
Gov.uk have issued advice to schools in England on how to prepare for Brexit - take a look.
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