Schoolsnet Bulletin Board

Adult Education in Gloucestershire are delivering the Level 3 Diploma in Children’s Learning and Development (Early Years Educator). The diploma is designed for people who work in, or want to work with children in Early Years settings, enabling you to work with children from birth to 5 years and gain knowledge of children aged 5-7 years.

Please find attached the Schools Forum Outcome Report from the meeting held on 11 January 2018.

Schools Forum Outcome Report

Primary, Secondary, Special LA maintained only (not Academies)

Internal Audit’s activity within schools is prioritised based on risk and as such, seven primary schools were visited during 2017/18.

Please be aware that updates to the inspection of schools under Section 8 and Section 5 came into effect in January 2018.

You may be aware that the funding for children and young people with additional needs is forecast to reduce in real terms over the next few years but the need is not diminishing. There is a real risk that some children will miss out – their needs will not be understood and they will struggle in the education world. In order to meet this challenge we need to re-think how we work.

Reward Band 3 - £51,369 – £55,755

Full-time position, Secondment

MMG bursaries, Singing Strategy, Cheltenham Festivals workshops, free advice sessions plus opportunities for your students and more are available at Make Music Gloucestershire, the County’s Music Education Hub. Primary   Secondary

To help run activities for Safer Internet Day on the 6 Feb 2018,  Education Packs have been created along with complementary SID TV films tailored for 3-7s, 7-11s, 11-14s, 14-18s. For further information please visit Safer Internet.

The Schools Forum elections which were due to take place in March 2017 were postponed for one year.

Gloucestershire SACRE joins with Herefordshire and Worcestershire for our fourth day for Special RE.

Venue: Adhisthana Buddhist Retreat Centre, Coddington, Hereford.

Following on from last year’s successful launch of the new Gloucestershire Agreed Syllabus for RE, the 2018 conference will be packed with practical and inspiring ideas for implementing the syllabus.  

Venue: Puckrup Hall, GL20 6EL.

Early Years Foundation Stage Profile Moderation Arrangements 2018

Important Process Up-dates

Following the introduction of the Apprenticeship Levy last year we’ve been working with a range of schools and training providers on their requirements and as a result we’ve up-dated the process for schools, the revised version is attached.

A school received a call at the end of last term from a person alleging to be working for Gloucestershire Police, asking if the school would like to advertise in On-Call, an emergency services magazine.

An invoice was subsequently received from a company called The Hannay Partnership Ltd for £175 plus £35 VAT (although the invoice states it is not a VAT invoice).

The Occupational Health department will be moving temporarily to Jordan’s Brook House on Monday 5 February.

Members of staff who have an occupational health appointment planned for February 2018 will be contacted by the dedicated administration team near the time of appointment.

Tootoot education is a pupil voice and safeguarding app, it provides pupils with a safe and anonymous way to speak about concerns such as bullying, harassment, mental health and racism. 

The Public Health School Nursing Service offer free Asthma, Anaphylaxis and Epilepsy awareness sessions providing valuable information, advice and guidance to support children with these medical conditions at school, see website. 

If you have appointed an NQT who has joined your school this term, please complete and return a NQT registration form by 22^nd January 2018 to: NQTs@gloucestershire.gov.uk 

The Spring Term Early Years Training Directory is now live on the webpage. Please see the website for details and to book Early Years Training  Training - Early Years Team

Never Such Innocence is a national charity set up to engage children and young people with the First World War commemorations.

The charity runs a poetry and art competition for 9-16 year olds which was piloted in England in 2014. Due to the success of the poetry and art competition, they introduced a musical strand, Songs of the Centenary, in 2016. 

When: Thursday 8^th February 2018

Where: High School for Girls (HSfG), Denmark Road, Gloucester, GL1 3JN

Up to 12 pupils and 2 members of staff per school may attend for FREE, thanks to support from the climate change education charity, Wicked Weather Watch, (https://wickedweatherwatch.org.uk/).

Deadline for bookings: Friday 12^th January 2018

Gloucestershire County Council has been reshaping their education service.

The interactive drama aimed at Year 4s is a very successful way of helping children see the potential dangers of the internet and how to keep themselves safe on-line

The DfE have launched new advice for governing bodies, proprietors, headteachers, principals, senior leadership teams and designated safeguarding leads: Sexual violence and sexual harassment between children in schools and colleges.

Gloucestershire County Council’s Employee Assistance Programme (EAP) has a variety of both practical help and emotional support available for you 24 hours a day.

We are delighted to announce the return of our Schools Conference Shaping the Future of Education in Gloucestershire again next year to Cheltenham Racecourse on Wednesday 7^th and Thursday 8^th February 2018

The Regional School Commissioner’s aim is to see all local areas in the South West developing strong local partnership arrangements which includes Local Standards Boards. It is hoped that we will over the next few months co-design a Local Standards Board for Gloucestershire with Headteachers, CEOs and other partners.

When: Thursday 1^st February 2018, 3pm – 6pm

Where: Cheltenham Racecourse

Who: Secondary students and above

What: The Big Launch is a big conversation about the vision for the future of Gloucestershire and will be an opportunity to learn about the new ideas for Gloucestershire and get involved in contributing your own.

THINK! has developed a suite of new resources for 3-6-year olds, making it easier for teachers to integrate road safety into lessons in fun and flexible ways.

The resources from the November briefings are now available. 

The resources from the first meetings of the year (November/December) for primary and secondary English, mathematics and science subject leaders are now available.

KS1 and KS2 Assessment and Moderation CPD events are being continued..

For guidance on how to spend the PE and Sport Grant Allocation, please go to PE and Sports Grant AY 17/18.

Gloucestershire Healthy Living and Learning have been offered a unique opportunity to invite secondary teachers to visit Gloucester Crown Court whilst it is in session on Friday 9th February at 09.30 - 13:00.  This will provide educational professionals with a unique insight into the English Criminal Justice system, support and inform the teaching of The Law, PSHE and Citizenship.

The DfE has updated today the ‘Primary school accountability in 2017’ technical guidance by confirming the ‘coasting’ definition for 2017 (no change from 2016).

Ofsted has provided documents offering guidance on how to interpret the new IDSR:

• an overview of data in the IDSR and information to assist in interpreting charts;
• details on how the ‘Areas to investigate’ are generated.

Live streaming is increasingly becoming one of the most popular online activities for children and young people. Apps such as Musical.ly, Live.me, Periscope and YouNow are all soaring in popularity, which has seen other well established apps such as Facebook adding live streaming functions. With this in mind it’s important that professionals are able to stay up to date with how children can stay safe when using these types of platforms.

The Online Pupil Survey (OPS) – the 12^th since 2006 – will be live for schools and colleges to access for 10 weeks from mid January until the end of March 2018.

Gloucestershire County Council is inviting all primary school children to enter a competition to help name our county’s new road gritters.

The closing date for the competition is 24 November.

Please note there are a variety of scam callers and emails targeting schools again for invoice payment

The Royal British Legion is at the heart of a national network that supports our Armed Forces community through thick and thin. As you may be aware, the Legion was created as a unifying force for the military charity sector at the end of the First World War, and still remains one of the UK’s largest membership organisations providing a range of support every day in communities like yours, across the UK.

FREE CPD, re-engagement in learning programmes, MMG bursaries and more are available at Make Music Gloucestershire.

Festivals, music with iPads, MMG bursaries, opportunities for your students and more are available at Make Music Gloucestershire.

For the majority of NQTs, completed NQT assessment paperwork should be returned to the LA by 1^st December 2017.  Please return the assessments from the Headteacher’s mailbox to: NQTs@gloucestershire.gov.uk

Venue: Dowty’s Sports & Social Club GL2 9QH

Dates: Friday 2nd February 2018 and Friday 9th March 2018

Session Times: Morning sessions: 9.15am – 12noon   Afternoon sessions: 1pm – 3.45pm

The 2017 Annual Meeting of the LGPS Pension Fund, the pension fund for support staff, will be held in the Council Chamber, Shire Hall at 12 noon on Friday the 1st December 2017. Employees who are members of the Fund are invited to attend.

A school in Gloucestershire has been invoiced for £876 after signing a request to check information that was held about the school. The Headteacher unwittingly signed the document without realising that they were committing the school to a fee for inclusion in an alleged company directory database. The cost is £73 per month, invoiced in advance for 12 months, with a commitment for a further 12 months. An early termination fee of £398 has been quoted when the school responded that they did not want the service being invoiced for.

Now winter is on its way and temperatures are decreasing, it is essential that you check all of your heating settings are up to date. This includes diary and temperature settings for the school term time as well as planning ahead for the Christmas Holidays/return to school in January 2018.

Theonline data reporting and visualisation tool, Lodeseeker™, is a tool through which schools can access their OPS, target areas of improvement; and to demonstrate to OFSTED how they are actively monitoring performance, and listening to Pupil Voice.