Dear Colleague

As we enter into the demands of the new calendar year I thought it might be helpful to write to all of you to set out the Council’s ambitions and priorities for the year ahead and how we can continue to improve our working relationship.

We are currently in the midst of our JAR process but in reality we already know the main challenges that lie ahead:

• to accelerate improvements in attainment at all key Stages

• to close the gap in differential performance between the highest performing and lowest performing schools, and between children from more prosperous and deprived backgrounds

• to improve levels of attendance and behaviour

• to improve our SEN provision in-borough

• to improve the health of our young people.

These priorities will be fully reflected in our new Local Area Agreement.

Overall, the Council is in good shape. We have recently been re-confirmed as a 3* authority that is improving well, and this year we actually achieved the highest score, 4*, for our use of resources. But within this overall context our Childrens’ Services performance, despite improvements, is not sufficiently strong and we have much work to do.

On the education side, last year we continued to see improvements in average attainment levels at most Stages but the rate of improvement is too gradual and our KS4 results still remain a little below the national average. In terms of Value Added performance (KS2 – KS4) we lie in the middle of the pack both in respect of London boroughs and national performance. I am not satisfied with that level of performance and I know that most of you share the same view.

Inside the Council, we need a Children Services department that is strong across all disciplines if we are to work effectively with you to meet the key challenges. We have made some good progress in the last twelve months including agreeing and starting to populate the new officer structure, establishing the School Improvement Board arrangements, opening more Children’s’ Centres, rolling out the Healthy Schools programme, establishing the Local Delivery Partnerships and early agreement of the Single Status package.

But far more work lies ahead for us this year:

• we do not yet have the depth of quality in the Council officer team that we need and there is further recruitment to be undertaken to achieve that goal

• we must complete the Secondary Schools Review with you to ensure that we have the optimum configuration of secondary schools provision going forward into the Building Schools for the Future process; there are some hard but crucial choices to be made over the next few months and I hope we can face up to those choices and work collaboratively in the best future interests of young people

• we will continue to progress the roll-out of the Children’s’ Centre programme

• we will look for further ways to embed the role, views and contribution of parents into our development of policies and programmes

• we will intensify our school improvement programme by being more systematic in our allocation of resources to schools and more robust in our monitoring and evaluation of progress

• we will strengthen the LDPs by ensuring that all relevant parts of the Local Strategic Partnership are supporting the LDPs in terms of co-ordinating service delivery

• we will be publishing a new youth strategy, with a renewed emphasis on the extended schools programme, youth engagement and youth justice

• we will be making a renewed effort to work with you to improve levels of school attendance

• we will be bringing forward further measures to improve attainment in maths and science

• we will be examining some of the barriers to effective recruitment and retention within schools and how we can work better collectively to address those issues

• we will be publishing and helping implement a new anti-bullying strategy

• we will be targeting some specific work on attainment and behaviour issues for African Caribbean boys, particularly in the transition between primary and secondary school

• we will be continuing to prepare for the changes in 14-19 education and this of course will also be reflected in the secondary schools review

We will also be seeking to build up our own financial resource base for facilitating school improvement. I announced at the Cabinet meeting in December that there would be no cuts to the Childrens’ Services programmes in the next financial year, Next month, I will be announcing the budget outcome for the education service which I am confident will bring positive news for our shared ambitions of better outcomes for our young people.

I will continue to be demanding of you as chairs of governors and head teachers. The reality is that too many of our young people are not benefiting from a high enough quality of education here in Croydon at the present time. We should not be satisfied to be in the middle of the pack. And where there is under-performance we must be honest that this is unacceptable and strive to work together to support those schools that are struggling for whatever set of reasons.

However, I recognise that for rapid transformation we need schools, the Council and other key partners to work together. The conferences last year were a good start, and we have used feedback from these events to shape our thinking on key priorities for the Department and the LDPs. You have told us that you do not yet know who within the Council is doing what, or who to contact for support or advice on particular issues. As we complete appointments to the senior management posts we will improve the information we sent to schools about who is here and what they do.

This then is my assessment of the challenges and priorities that lie ahead. I would welcome your views and responses, either by writing to me at the Town Hall or by email (maria.gatland@croydon.gov.uk). I am convinced that if we can increase the trust between us and really commit to work together, we can make significant progress in the year that lies ahead.