Simon Thomas (FACT Programme Lead) will present an update on the Families and Children’s Transformation Programme (FACT) to the Forum.
Minutes:
Simon Thomas (FACT Programme Lead) gave an update on the FACT programme and highlighted the following:
· The FACT Partnership mission is ‘Working together to improve opportunities and outcomes for children, young people and families across Wiltshire by developing excellent system wide approaches that make best use of all available resources’. There was also a vision for our Children, Young People and Families and for the Partnership;
· Partners feeling engaged is critical to the work on a number of priorities;
· Over the last 12 months the partnership had reviewed the project work they were doing. There had been a total of 27 projects and the partnership felt that this was too many and the work was getting a bit lost. The group of partners then decided to review their activity and pinned the work down to 7 priority multi agency projects;
· Speech language and communication – This project was a looking at the fundamental stepping stones for a good start at school and was moving along really well;
· Earliest support in communities – This was a project to push and develop early support in communities;
· Young People’s Service – This was looking at multi agency responses to ensure good wrap around services that work together in the best possible ways to provide a great service for Wiltshire’s young people;
· Transitional safeguarding – There had been a real push with this project and they were about to go live with a pilot for 16-25 year olds. This was focusing on putting the right services in place for young people who were vulnerable to exploitation/ on the edge of care/suffering drug and or alcohol issues/living chaotic lifestyles, having identified that when they move from children to adult services the risks don’t get managed as well as they could. This project would look to ensure that their safeguarding and the transition is as solid as it can be and that the right services are in place for them to transition;
· Integrated working – This project was looking at how the Council and health partners work together to ensure that they commission the right services and how are they working for the young people and families;
· Alternative provision – All schools will already be familiar with alternative provision;
· Early Support Assessment - Following feedback from practitioners about the need for lots of school involvement the partnership had developed the ESA to replace the Common Assessment Framework (CAF) which was easier for schools to navigate – the project had another 6 months to run and the partnership would appreciate school input into their learning and would be reflecting on their feedback with the implementation of this change;
· Coming out of Covid – the partnership had agreed that an area of development would be Early Help. They know that a lot of work is going on but they are told by practitioners, schools and families that it is hard to find out what services are out there and how to get in touch. They had identified some gaps and were working to really reflect what they Early Help Strategy should look like and what could they learn from other Local Authorities and partnerships? This project was still to be scoped and schools’ input would be vital; and
· Six key elements of a Partnership Early Help Strategy had been identified and they would build on the good things already in place and look at what could be done better.
Resolved
That Schools Forum note the FACT programme update.