Agenda item

2.00 pm

Exclusions in Oxfordshire have been a cause for concern to Members, Officers, Parents, the Oxfordshire Safeguarding Board and Children’s Trust for several years.  Education Scrutiny Committee commenced a deep dive investigation into the issues in 2018.  Accordingly, Education Scrutiny Committee has requested an update briefing on the current position of School Exclusions in Oxfordshire.

The Education Scrutiny Committee is RECOMMENDED to consider and note this report.

Exclusions in Oxfordshire had been a cause for concern to Members, Officers, Parents, the Oxfordshire Safeguarding Board and Children’s Trust for several years.  Education Scrutiny Committee had carried out a deep dive investigation into the issues in 2018.  Accordingly, Education Scrutiny Committee had before it a report which provided an update on the current position of School Exclusions in Oxfordshire.

Deborah Bell, in introducing the report explained that at the beginning of the academic year 2019/20, there was a rapid increase of permanent exclusions which was of great concern, whilst that rate of increase had slowed down and stabilised, it was still in an upward trajectory and Oxfordshire, if COVID had not happened would have seen a very worrying figure by the end of the year. 

Since writing the report, the figure had further reduced and now stood at 68, as 5 of the numbers had been rescinded.  There had however, been an increase in primary exclusions, especially for those with special educational needs and disabilities, and there was work being undertaken to address this particular cohort.

At primary school, those most excluded were boys 87% reducing in secondary to 59%.  In Oxfordshire there was a disproportioned excluding of children with SEN support which was higher than the national position.  The main reason for exclusion was persistent disruptive behaviour, followed by verbal abuse or threatening behaviour against an adult.  The reasons were proving to be subjective, with what one school would find acceptable another school excluding for.  There had been a lot of work carried out at Senior Officer and Officer level, with regard to the increase in trend and a new officer post had been funded out of existing funds to provide a response to schools when they were at the end of their tether, and this had gone a long way to slow down the increase in trend.

They had also created a multi-agency task and finish group which had created a behaviour pathway that schools are now expected to follow before they exclude a child which wraps in the need for an early help assessment which takes account of societal or family needs and assessment of any SEN which were unmet.

Conversations around inclusive cultures and ethical leadership were routinely held with heads and chairs.  Restorative practice had been adopted and was currently being rolled out to all schools across the County and they had managed to adapt the training to an online offer.  They were already seeing very positive outcomes in those schools that had received an embedded the training.

The Committee made the following points during debate:

The Committee noted that a reason cited by the schools for exclusion was insufficient SEN provision in the County and a lack of affordable alternative provision.  The Chairman noted that this issue was likely to come up in the joint work to be undertaken with the Performance Scrutiny Committee.

Deborah Bell reminded members of the large piece of work being undertaken to look at alterative provision, together with the joint commissioning work underway.  The special school estate was also being expanded. 

Jane Portman, Interim Director for Children’s Services reported that 2 new special schools were due to be built, one in the north and one in the south and an expansion project for the old Northfield School which was now the Ryan Academy. 

The Committee queried whether there was enough CPD available and whether schools were doing all they could and whether adequate training was provided for school staff on how to address persistent disruptive behaviour, particularly from an early age so that it did escalate further up the schools.

Deborah Bell responded that there was a rich breadth of CPD available for schools to support teachers’ response to behaviour.  All of it cost money both internally and externally and there were a lot of conflicting demands on school’s shrinking budgets.  She gave an assurance that her team advocated wherever possible.

The Committee queried of the permanent exclusions, how many were children who already had a second fresh start and how many were excluded without an In-year fair access panel.  Deborah Bell undertook to provide that information to the Committee. 

The Chairman asked whether they could receive trend data over the past two or three years so that it could established whether individual schools and academies were high excluding schools or whether it was a blip to their normal practice.

Councillor Howson expressed the importance of keeping exclusions under review so that a constant overview and monitoring could be undertaken on the effects of issues such as academisation and the national school funding formula to ensure that it was not disadvantaging some children.

Deborah Bell confirmed that Oxfordshire remained comfortably under the national average for exclusions.

The Chairman thanked Deborah Bell for her report.