What’s working and what’s not? Children’s POET East of England – Achieving Our Ambitions Conference 26th November 2015 Claire Lazarus, Associate, In Control.

What’s working and what’s not?Children’s POET

East of England – Achieving Our Ambitions Conference26th November 2015Claire Lazarus, Associate, In Control and Siobhan MacBean, Service Development Manager, Cambridgeshire County Council

Today

• In Control

• Personal Outcomes and Evaluation Tool – POET

• Cambridgeshire’s experience

• Maximising East of England returns

Children’s Programme – evolving into a Whole Life Programme Bespoke support• 3 x 2-day residentials held annually• Publications• The network• Resources• Projects• External facing and members website

What POET gives

• A way of measuring and understanding performance

• Local (regional) and national data• A focus on process as well as outcomes• Datasets big enough to enable us to

address questions that could not be investigated using local data only

Evidence from the adult POET surveys - outcomes are better if:-• Views fully included when needs are

being assessed• There is support to plan• Views fully included when the amount

of budget is set and the personal budget (PB) process is easy

• Views fully included when a support plan is written

Why POET works• Low cost• Quick and easy to complete on line or

on paper• Able to be repeated• Asks meaningful questions about

what’s working (and what isn’t working)

• Voluntary• Gets views of children & young people,

families and carers and practitioners• Provides feedback • Supports action planning

Children and Young People’s POET – DfE funding to developA tool to capture:-

• The experience of obtaining an Education Health and Care Plan (EHCP) and in some cases a personal budget from the perspective of the child/young person, family and practitioner

• Outcomes of having an EHCP (and in some cases a personal budget)

SEND Code of Practice

“At a strategic level, partners must engage children and young people with SEN disabilities and children’s parents in commissioning decisions, to give useful insights on how to improve services and outcomes.” (3.18)

“Local authorities, Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs) and NHS England (NHSE) must develop effective ways of harnessing their views.” (3.18)

Measuring success

Special educational needs and disability: supporting local and national accountability

March 2015

Measuring the success of the SEND systemExamples of data and intelligence:-• SEN appeals and outcomes• EHCPs completed on time• LA and parent survey data• POET • Feedback from Independent

Supporters

East of England areas testing POET now – deadline 1st week in January• Bedfordshire Borough• Cambridgeshire• Central Bedfordshire• Essex• Hertfordshire• Peterborough• Suffolk• Thurrock

Cambridgeshire’s Experience

• Local context• Why we did it• Maximising return of questionnaires• What we used results for• Lessons learnt• What next

Local Context• Part of pilot group• Not a pathfinder • No EHCPs last year so just for those with per-

sonal budgets• Well established personal budgets in social

care• Well established good participation with par-

ents and carers

• Participation for children and young people – we

wanted to do more

Why We Did it• Wanted robust evidence of what works and what

doesn’t• Interested in people’s views• Added to/complemented things we were do-

ing already

• To know where to focus our action and en-ergy

• Asking the questions says something about what

we think is important• To be involved!

Maximising Returns

• Involved parent groups in developing communication

• Individual letters• Freepost return envelopes• Email newsletter circulation lists

• Our own and others• Websites

• Our own and others• Attending parents events and promoting

Maximising Returns• Large circulation for practitioners – and lots of

reminding!• Produced accessible versions for young

people• Lots of opportunities for young people to do

it• At home• Short breaks• School

• Put it on lots of meeting agendas• Publicised results – helped this time round• Constant commitment and promoting

How we used the results• Shared widely - Families, teams, services, boards, groups, councillors, schools

• On our local offer• Promoted positive messages

• Parents/carers felt listened to and in-volved

• Good process• Parents/carers felt personal budgets had

brought positives for their children• Parents/carers and workers felt children

and young peoples needs were being met

• Good PR and motivating for teams

How we used the results• Identified some areas to focus on• Making sure plans met needs going into

the future as well as now

• Addressing parent/carers own needs• Feedback informed some strategies – espe-

cially changes to our preparing for adulthood

process• In local engagement sessions• Checked against other feedback loops/pro-

cesseswe have

Lessons Learnt• Need a lead• Involve parents/carers and young people • Make it easy to do• Keep reminding and give lots of opportunities

to do it – especially workers• Mention it loads – and then mention some

more!• Gets easier each year – people get used to it

and just do it

• Get competitive• Promote the results and what you did• Promote the national aspect – and the Ofsted

angle

What next………?• Looking forward to benchmarking opportunity• Ability to look at and use own results

• Can focus on particular areas/themes of rel-evance locally

• Can collate at time/s that suits local pro-cesses

• Able to see where responses are coming/not coming from as we go along and address

• Data and the comparisons gets richer each year• Will be using as Ofsted evidence

OFSTED/CQC - Local area SEND consultation• Inspectors will expect the local area to

understand how effective it is, including any aspects of its responsibilities that require further development

• Inspectors will test out the evidence that the local area uses in its self-evaluation

• Inspectors will evaluate how effectively the local area meets the needs and improves the outcomes of children and young people with SEND

• A wide range of ways will be used during the

OFSTED/CQC - Local area SEND consultation• A wide range of ways will be used during

the inspection to obtain the views of children and young people with SEND and their parents/carers

• Effectiveness of personal budgets• Process questions

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TshAholGU9k

Maximising the number of returns across the East of England

Thank you

• [email protected] 787190

• [email protected]• 01223 699 041

• POET Web Page

• www.in-control.org.uk