Agenda and minutes

Apologies were received from the following partners:

Karla Banfield

Nicky Bridges

Kathryn Craner

Gary Eves

Amanda Payne

Cheryl Steele

Catherine Underwood

Minutes of the last meeting are unavailable

The Chair explained that the minutes of the last meeting were unavailable due to the officer who attended the meeting having left the authority.

Presentation by Jasmin Howell,  Nick Lee & Peter McConnochie

Jasmin Howell, Virtual School Head, Maddi Popoola, Educational Psychologist, and Peter McConnochie, Head of Access to Learning, delivered a presentation and highlighted the following:

(a)  in September 2021 all Virtual School Heads were given the additional duty of becoming strategic leaders in championing the educational outcomes of children with a social worker and those who have previously had a social worker. These children were identified as a group who face significant barriers to education, due to experiences of adversity and trauma;

(b)  since these duties were established, the Virtual School Head has worked with key partners within the authority in order to look at what can be done to improve outcomes for these children. These improvements aim to improve outcomes for all vulnerable children, not just those with a  social worker, in a framework that can be co-ordinated by one person;

(c)  the aim is not to duplicate services, but to pool resources and gather outcomes in order to gain a real picture of all that is available for schools to access to help them support these children. Current resources include the Route 2 Inclusion Strategy, Mental Health Lead support, |Designated Safeguarding Leads, and the online resource library;

(d)   all of the workforce should be trauma-aware, and take the view that all children and young people have experienced some kind of trauma. A pilot to train staff is being built with a  secondary school;

(e)  the most vulnerable point for many children and young people is permanent exclusion, which has an impact on their future and also has a high financial cost. The majority of permanent exclusions are from secondary schools, and the local authority has been working on a model of inclusion which every secondary school has now signed up to. However, the number in Nottingham remain high so this pathway will support reductions;

(f)  the next step will be to recruit some staff to develop and implement the pathway, including a Vulnerable Learning Co-Ordinator, and Education Advisor and a Data Officer. These will be funded through a grant from the government. The aim is to share the Strategy in February 2023 and engage with the workforce.

Presentation by Emma Bates

Emma Bates, Nottingham Financial Resilience Partnership (NFRP), delivered a presentation and highlighted the following:

(a)  in 2019, Nottingham City had the lowest level of Gross Disposable Household Income in the country, with high levels of low paid work;

(b)  the more debt people have, the more likely they are to have mental health problems, feelings pf economic pressure and family conflicts. This can lead to further mental health problems in children. Debt can also lead to physical health problems such as chronic fatigue and disability;

(c)  8.9 million people in the UK borrowed more during the Covid-19 pandemic. The Bank of England reported in February 2022 consumer credit borrowing had risen overall and that annual growth rate for credit card borrowing had increased by 9.4%.  This is a worrying trend during the current cost of living crisis;

(d)  Just below one million adults have no bank account and in 2017 21% of the population said that they would need to borrow money if they needed £200 at short notice. Having savings has been proved to have a positive impact on your well-being. Government measures to help people to save include Junior ISAs, pension auto-enrolment and the Help to Save Scheme but these are not suitable for everyone and can have low take-up;

(e)  financial education has been compulsory in secondary schools since 2014 but this is variable by school and should begin at a younger age with primary school. Numeracy is closely linked with financial capability in adults. The NFRP has a package of support available for primary schools;

(f)  from 2012 onwards every child in care is eligible for a Junior ISA with £200 from the government. The young person can take control of the account at the age of 16 and access the funds at the age of 18. There is a large number of unclaimed accounts due to the need to fill in a form to claim. Alongside this are the Stepladder packages of support but only 8 children have undertaken this to date;

The following points were made during the discussion which followed:

(g)  there are many free resources on financial resilience available for schools but few of these are used except for a Martin Lewis textbook in secondary schools;

(h)  it is difficult for primary heads to sustain a curriculum on financial resilience when they have so many other pressures. Commitment is required by the Council to support schools on their approach. More tracti9on might be gained if it were integrated into other programmes such as Small Steps Big Changes or universal services so that it doesn’t seem like a new piece of work;

(i)  if Family Hubs are introduced in Nottingham City then financial resilience services could be integrated into these.

None.

The forward plan was noted.

It was suggested that the Nottingham South Careers Hub be invited to the meeting in December, along with an update on the Ofsted inspection.

To meet on the following Tuesdays at 4pm:

·  27 September 2022

·  6 December 2022

·  28 March 2023

The Board noted the dates for the 2022-23 municipal year.