Home > Agenda item

Agenda item

Children's Social Care and Education Dashboards

Minutes:

The Chair explained that several meetings had taken place between himself and the Programme Director for the Improvement Journey to finalise what the dashboards should look like and the data required.

 

The Chair requested a set of diagnostic indicators to be presented at each meeting which would enable Members to be able to identify areas that required in depth discussion and scrutiny. It was suggested that the Sub-Committee use this version for a few months before adding any other parameters.

 

The Director of Early Help and Children’s Social Care presented the Children’s social care dashboard report and the following was noted:

 

  • Performance was tracked around a number of areas including LAC, Caseloads, CIN and referrals to Early Help.
  • Increase in assessments completed within 44 days
  • Since lockdown performance in completion of visits has been assisted by virtual ways of working.
  • Face to face visits with children on child protection plans had remained consistent including during the lockdown period and plans have been recorded in line with deadlines.

 

 

The Interim Director of Education presented the Education dashboard and the following was noted:

 

  • This was the first time that had created a dashboard and this would be useful in identifying trends and comparisons in areas such as attendance, elective home education and attendance.
  • Going forward, elective home education and children missing from education would be included in the dashboard.
  • The dashboard would enable regular information to be shared in areas of quality such as a school’s Ofsted ratings.

 

Following presentations, the Sub-Committee took the opportunity to ask questions.

 

In response to a question on the percentages of cases audited in Children’s services and the quality of those audits, Officers said that each round of audits demonstrated that the quality of cases was improving. In the last audit one case was rated as inadequate. More work needed to be done on how the data was presented to the Sub-Committee as reporting on a monthly basis did not provide a true reflection. Further work would be done with the performance team to ensure that statistically accurate data would be presented to Members on a quarterly basis.

 

Member’s sought reassurance that the dashboard format and presentation of data would remain the same to ensure consistency of metrics and comparison to enable appropriate scrutiny and officers agreed to this.

 

A Member commented that the department was leading in the use of KPIs and performance measures and that this was reassuring, as this has not been the case for a number of years.  The Chair was also commended for all his work with officers in pushing forward better access and sharing of information with the Sub-Committee.

 

It was suggested that the Croydon Digital Service could assist in ensuring that information was transparent and easily assessable to the public as well as Councillors. Additionally that comparative information could be accessed through the LGA Inform. Although Croydon was not a member of LGA Inform it was agreed that it would be beneficial for Councillors and officers to have membership in order to have access to this wealth of data.

 

Officers were thanked for their responses to questions.

 

 

 

 

In reaching its recommendations the Sub-Committee came to the following Conclusions:

 

  1. The reduction of Looked After Children in children’s services was positive
  2. There was a notable improvement in audit figures which was currently not reflected in the data. Consideration needed to be given to how this was presented, for example quarterly, which would provide a more accurate representation.
  3. Future Education dashboards needed to include figures of children missing from education and those in elective home education.
  4. It was important that the data presented include comparative information, in particular in SEND in order to form a full picture and aid better understanding of the financial challenge.
  5. The Sub-Committee would continue to work together to provide feedback and suggestions on the content of the dashboards.
  6. It was important for Councillors to have access to benchmarking tools in order to be able to compare and analyse data and assess performance locally, regionally and nationally.

 

The Sub-Committee resolved to Recommend:

  1. That the next Education dashboard presented include the amount of children split into groups, primary, secondary or college in education in the borough.
  2. That the Council make provision for Councillors to have access to LG Inform to enable them to compare and analyse data.
  3. That the Chief Digital Officer explore ways of automating dashboards once reporting parameters have been finalised.

 

 

Supporting documents: