The delayed publication of the Government's prospectus for extended schools in June - it was expected in November last year - signalled a dramatic acceleration of its plans to develop wraparound childcare and a range of additional services for children, families and communities.
This flagship programme, embracing a flotilla of other Government initiatives aimed at using schools to embed integrated services in communities, has been well and truly launched. But is it entering choppy waters with meagre financial rations on board and doubts over the direction it should take, or is it plain sailing ahead?
The Government plans to spend a further 680m up to 2008, on top of the 160m already committed to the programme from 2003 to 2006. By July next year 2,500 extended schools will be in place and by 2010 the Government wants all schools, working in partnership with other schools or childcare providers, to ensure access to year-round childcare from 8am to 6pm. Half of all primary schools and a third of all secondary schools are expected to reach this goal by 2008.
Since the first batch of extended schools was unveiled in 2003, the Government has modified its original concept, deciding that the full service model was too prescriptive, and schools and local authorities have been given greater latitude in how they deliver the programme.
The prospectus states, 'We previously funded a category of full-service extended school with a specific remit of services. But now we want all schools and children and families to be able to access a core of extended services which are developed in partnership with others.'
It adds, 'Extended school is not a status that schools centrally apply for as there is no blueprint for the types of activities that schools might offer.'
This change of tack has echoes of the evolution of the children's centre model, where the notion that brand new facilities should proliferate in every community has been junked in favour of satellite services. In both cases the Government claims that the change is intended to extend the scope of services, but the enormous cost of putting its original ideas into practice is likely to have been a factor.
Core services
In addition to wraparound childcare, the core offer of services in mainstream and special schools is expected to include:
* a varied menu of activities: such as homework clubs and study support, sport (at least two hours a week beyond the school day for those who want it), music tuition, dance and drama
* parenting support: including information sessions for parents at key transition points in their child's development, parenting classes and family learning sessions to allow children to learn with their parents
* swift and easy referral to a wide range of specialist support services: including speech therapy and child and adult mental health services, as well as behavioural and sexual health support services.
The DfES does not expect all primary schools to offer extended services on their own sites. They may work with other schools in the area and in partnership with other agencies, including the private or voluntary sector and primary care trusts, to deliver them. But the prospectus says the Government's expectations for secondary schools are different, indicating that they should be open all year round, from 8am to 6pm, and offer a range of activities for young people.
Remodelling link
The extended schools programme is based on the five outcomes identified as important by children themselves and which underpin the Every Child Matters agenda: to be healthy, to stay safe, to enjoy and achieve, to make a positive contribution and to achieve economic wellbeing. It is also now being strongly linked to the process of remodelling being undertaken within schools to lift administrative burdens from heads and other teaching staff.
The National Remodelling Team is working closely with ContinYou, a voluntary sector organisation that has been contracted by the Government to provide the extended schools support service.
Julian Piper, national programme director of the support service, says 240 local authority remodelling advisers are currently in place and are in the process of creating teams of remodelling consultants. He estimates that by the end of the year there should be about 1,000 remodelling consultants 'trained and ready to work with clusters of schools in every local authority'.
Mr Piper emphasises the importance of linking existing remodelling of the school workforce with the development of extended schools, using the untapped talent of non-teaching staff and reducing the pastoral burden on teachers. He cites the example of a Birmingham headteacher who, 18 months ago, found that 60 per cent of her time was spent on duties related to social care - 'not what she is paid for or good at'. With workforce remodelling and extended schools status, only 15 per cent of her time is now spent on these aspects.
In rural Northumberland the Haydon Bridge Community High School serves one of the largest catchment areas in the country and deputy head Barbara Mansfield says many of the extended services it provides are crucial to the scattered population because they may not exist elsewhere.
She says, 'Unlike urban areas, we are not able to access much funding so we have become very skilful at remodelling.' She adds that teaching assistants and youth workers play a key role in the extended provision, emphasising the importance of ensuring professional pathways for those in education who are not qualified teachers.
Staffing concerns
The DfES prospectus insists, 'Extended schools are not about extended hours for teachers and headteachers. Workforce remodelling will have provided schools with the skills to create a staffing structure appropriate to the extended services they wish to deliver. Schools should look at the expertise both within the school and locally to determine the best person to deliver each aspect of extended services.'
Teaching unions are wary of the Government's proposals because they fear an increased burden on their members. The relationship between unions representing teachers and support staff is due to be explored this month, on 7 September, at a conference co-sponsored by the National Union of Teachers, Unison and the charity 4Children.
John Craig of the think-tank Demos, who has carried out in-depth research on extended schools, says, 'The issues of extended schooling and workforce reform are inextricably linked. You cannot succeed in one without the other. Central Government cannot produce a blueprint for 24,000 extended schools, and while that gives many teachers the freedom to innovate that they have been asking for, for many it's also very new and very daunting.'
John Richards, Unison's senior national officer for education, says extended services create new employment opportunities for his members, but he warns, 'The downside is the possibility of multiple contracts if different employers use them and offer them different terms and conditions.'
Accessing funds
In a letter sent to local authority leaders when the prospectus was published, Naomi Eisenstadt, director of the Sure Start extended schools and families group, says that revenue funding will continue to be channelled through both the Standards Fund and the general Sure Start grant, which includes a capital funding allocation 'specifically to support small capital projects in primary schools'.
She urges local authorities to distribute funds in 'as unbureaucratic a way as possible' and to avoid 'burdensome bidding rounds' by releasing them after wide consultation with the community and the development of a strategic plan.
She adds, 'The funding is to help start up extended services. Our expectation is that over time these services should become sustainable either through charging, for example for childcare, or through reconfiguring funding strands at local level through children's trusts pooling budgets to support extended services in schools.'
The co-location of an extended school and a children's centre can be considered so that the services provided, for example, by a primary care trust, are not duplicated. This would also benefit parents who have both school-age and pre-school children. The prospectus states, 'Funding for children's centres, including capital funds, can be linked with that available for extended school services.'
Anne Longfield, chief executive of 4Children, says the funding is 'more than it has been in the past' but is still 'very much start-up funding' and should be 'used wisely to get the business plan into place'.
Julian Piper says some of the focus should come off funding as often fairly modest amounts of money are needed to kick-start services. He insists, 'There are lots of people out there in the voluntary sector with resources who are ready and waiting to work with schools.'
No one size fits all
The Government plans to legislate so that local authorities have a legal obligation to meet the childcare needs of parents, particularly those in disadvantaged areas and those with disabled children. In its recent guidance to local authorities, the DfES said that any childcare provided through the extended schools programme 'should be in line with the local authority's overall strategic plan for the local area'.
The decision not to stick rigidly to the full-service model is enabling both schools and local authorities to develop innovative models more attuned to community need and more in keeping with existing structures.
York City Council created shared community partnerships centred on the city's 53 primary schools in 2001 to co-ordinate work around the Foundation Stage. Heather Marsland, head of early years and extended schools, says the partnerships have proved the ideal platform for developing extended provision.
The schools initially linked up with nurseries, playgroups and childminders in their area, but now the partnerships often embrace health, social services and crime prevention officers. The partnerships, which have a development worker attached to them, produce an action plan each term.
Ms Marsland says, 'Funding is devolved to these partnerships. They can club together to use it, and we are able to communicate easily and quickly with everyone as an LEA.'
Meanwhile Sandwell, in the industrial heartland of the West Midlands, has chosen to stick with the full-service model because it suits the make-up of its six towns. Each has a full-service extended school and each is planning another one.
Phil Watts, Sandwell's principal adviser on extended and inclusive learning, says that while all the borough's schools will be expected to become extended schools, they could join together in 'consortia' to deliver a 'matrix of provision'.
The process has been complemented and helped by the creation of Sure Start children's centres on primary school sites, 'so we have the core of a multi-disciplinary team already working there', he says.
While neighbourhood renewal money has been accessed for some services, Mr Watts insists that in areas such as family learning it may not cost any more and 'may be just a question of reconfiguring what is already there'.
Concerned that quality, rather than quantity, should be the yardstick for measuring the effectiveness of extended provision, he initiated a national quality standard for extended schools. Developed in conjunction with four other councils, the award scheme is currently being extended to a further 20 LEAs before it is applied nationally.
In Devon, extended schools manager Jon Bell says the full-service model is more geared to urban areas and is not suited to a large, mainly rural, county.
The authority, therefore, decided to attach the county's 370 schools to 32 learning communities, based around the academic councils developed 20 years ago which reflected the importance of market towns in Devon's geographical make-up. Mr Bell says the local NHS and social services have acknowledged that this structure makes it easier for them to become involved in extended provision.
Each learning community has a designated development worker and extended schools staff are employed by the LEA, not the schools. Mr Bell line-manages them as a county officer, while they work day to day with a learning community and report to a headteacher.
'Staff are tasked with developing a plan to show how funding will be used in a learning community, and once that has been agreed it is signed off by the chair of the learning community and myself,' he says.
But while a statutory duty is being placed on local authorities to deliver childcare, schools are not legally obliged to get involved in the extended schools programme. Bob Janes, cabinet member for education at Derbyshire County Council, believes 'the relationship with schools could be a challenge, as they seem to achieve greater independence of action'.
Engaging schools
John Craig says that 'through funding streams and inspection, the incentives for schools to get involved are extremely strong. They will need very good reasons not to engage with this work'.
Dr Paul Doherty, co-author of 'Towards the Development of Extended Schools'
and now working at North Prospect Community School in Plymouth as a consultant on its extended provision, believes the Government decision to channel Pounds 250 million direct to schools may have been 'a carrot to overcome resistance at school level'.
Maggie Farrar, assistant director of leadership programmes at the National College for School Leadership, says that pressure for schools to engage also comes from new standards for headteachers that include a requirement to strengthen community through collaboration.
Chris Watts, head of North Prospect Community School, which has just opened a GP surgery linked to the extended school and children's centre on the school site, has been seconded part time to work on the extended schools programme in Plymouth and is adamant that all schools should eventually be involved.
He says, 'I have told governor training sessions that this is an inclusive policy - it's about all schools. If a school chooses not to opt in initially, that's fine. But I want an agreement in principle that this is the way to go and I want them kept up to date with what's happening.'
Co-ordinator role
Julian Piper believes that schools that have appointed extended schools'
co-ordinators from outside the teaching profession have generally engaged more effectively and quickly with the programme 'because they are prepared to ask questions which others would not know to ask'.
Maggie Farrar agrees and stresses that the relationship between the headteacher and the extended schools co-ordinator is 'critical'. She says that co-ordinators are increasingly being drawn from the community sector.
'They may have a regeneration background and that brings a new dynamic into the leadership teams of schools.'
They play a pivotal role in brokering relations with other sectors, such as health and social care, and getting to grips with cultural differences to build a coherent extended team, she adds.
Dr Doherty identifies the break with what he terms 'the silo mentality', where people find it difficult to work across agency boundaries, as a major challenge. 'There is a lot of pressure and preciousness about who is responsible for what. But the great danger is also that people are talking inter-agency, rather than inter-disciplinary,' he says.
Using expertise
School governors must endorse any plans for extended provision as well as oversee and evaluate them, possibly as part of a steering group with community links. While safeguarding the schools delegated budget, their brief may include hiring staff and they can help to locate additional funding sources, secure suitable insurance and appoint extra staff.
Dr Doherty says that if schools are expected to take on what amounts to commercial activities, they need training. He points out that governing bodies often contain individuals, such as lawyers and accountants, who can provide invaluable advice.
Anne Longfield suggests that, since running extended provision requires schools to develop a robust business model, it may be time to consider appointing chief executives of schools.
Conclusion
There are still issues to be resolved, including business modelling, charging policies, staffing and longer-term funding. But Ms Longfield says that although the prospectus does not offer a blueprint for extended schools, it does outline more clearly the Government's vision of how schools can be at the hub of community provision.
For Chris Watts, who has been a leading advocate of partnership and multi-agency working in and around schools, the goal is clear: 'Ultimately, the best scenario will be when teachers live and breathe and speak the same as health professionals, social services people and community providers, because we are all aiming for the five key outcomes for children and young people.'
Case study
Meeting local needs
Franche First School in Kidderminster was pioneering extra services for children and families long before the architects of the extended schools initiative.
From its first forays into out-of-school care in 1989 to developing wraparound childcare and, in 2003, opening its own baby unit in an adjoining house, the school has always geared each new service to parental demand.
TOTS, which cares for babies and children aged up to two, is funded by the Neighbourhood Nursery Initiative and was opened by Baroness Cathy Ashton in 2003.
Val Weddell-Hall, who has been head of the Worcestershire school since 1984, says the initial impetus for out-of-school care came from parents anxiously seeking work after the local carpet industry slumped in to recession in the late 1980s.
'When we surveyed parents they wanted the school to open from 7am to 6pm, so that is why we set up our out-of-school care in 1993 and called it 7-2-6. It is essential to find out what parents and the community really need because different areas need different things,' she says.
The extended service is open 50 weeks of the year, and in the holidays it costs just 14 a day per child, including meals, a variety of day trips and sporting activities - the school has its own indoor pool.
It has proved a magnet for children from 14 other local schools and Franche First lays on transport to ferry them around.
'The children enjoy all the activities, whether it's the roller-blading club, football, swimming or visits to the golf club or a local forest. It stimulates their brains and definitely helps raise standards,' Mrs Weddell-Hall adds.
While Franche First features on a DfES-backed website as an example of an extended school, its additional services do not attract Government funding and it is too small to be designated an extended school.
'It would be wonderful to have some capital money to extend our facilities, but money is not the key factor. Where there is a will there is a way and we have had marvellous support down the years from the LEA, businesses and the local community,' she says, citing the support given by the neighbouring West Midlands Co-op.
Case study
Developing parents' literacy and numeracy skills
Parents are brushing up their numeracy and literacy skills at Bevendean Primary School in Brighton so they are better able to help their children with homework. Deputy head Joan Marshall, who is responsible for the school's extended service provision, says family learning, funded by grants from Brighton and Hove City Council and the Learning and Skills Council, is increasingly popular.
'We tend to target particular year groups where we know that family learning will pay dividends. If we catch the parents early and they see familiar faces around the school it puts them at ease and they become supportive of the school,' she explains.
The courses involve parents either learning for some of the time with their children or being taught separately.
Alison Nye, a mother of two boys aged four and ten, and who works in the after-school club, recently passed two GCSEs in maths and English after attending the family learning courses.
'It has extended my knowledge and means I can keep up with the work my children are doing. I now want to do a history course. My eldest son actually thinks it's quite cool that I have gone back to school,' she says.
Gill Meyne, family learning co-ordinator with Brighton Children, Families and Schools Directorate, says 70 family learning literacy and numeracy classes are being run in the city, covering 700 families.
She says, 'We argue that this work is critical because schools have changed a great deal. Lots of parents feel very unskilled when it comes to supporting their children's numeracy and literacy work.
'The courses are useful because parents can find out how their children are being taught and can support them more effectively at home. We run a course called Keeping up with the Children, but many parents now want to overtake them!'
Case study
Setting up a school company
Edmund Waller Primary School in Lewisham, south London, set up the UK's first school company to develop its out-of-school childcare and other extended services.
Headteacher Graham Jameson, who sits on the board of directors, says, 'We went down this route because we wanted to have the before- and after-school provision for the children on a more organised footing. Previously it was run by a voluntary committee, but there was a high turnover of members.
Doing it through a company makes it more systematic, more democratic in responding to parents' needs and more closely allied to the school, and it works better.'
The company, Edmund Waller School Services, is a registered charity that is independent of the school governors. Its board includes four community representatives, an LEA representative and a member nominated by the parent-teacher association as well as the head, his deputy, a finance director and a company secretary, Mark Johnson.
The board meets five times a year, its minutes are open to scrutiny by all governors and the annual general meeting is open to all parents and interested parties from the local community. However, day-to-day control is delegated to Mr Jameson, who line-manages the ten part-time staff and a senior play leader employed by the company.
Mr Johnson, a lawyer, dealt with the legal issues involved in creating the company. He says, 'The company provides a forum for joined-up thinking between the governors, the PTA, the school management team and the wider community.'
The company currently provides after-school care, a breakfast club and holiday play schemes for 120 children aged four to 12 who either attend the school or live locally. He says it intends to develop other extended services for children and adults.
The school's last Ofsted report notes that the creation of the company, which was funded through a mixture of parental subscriptions and grants from New Deal for Communities, Lewisham Children's Fund and the New Opportunities Fund, represents 'an exciting new phase for both school and community'.
Guidance on school companies is available from www.teachernet.gov.uk/management/atoz/s/schoolcompanies
Case study Learning about healthy lifestyles
Dancing, gardening and cooking top the menu of extended services at Archbishop Sumner Primary School in Lambeth, south-west London, where school nurses from the local primary care trust (PCT) are teaching children about healthy lifestyles.
Extended schools co-ordinator Babs Wright says the Fit4Kids programme, which operates as a weekly after-school club at a cost to parents of just 5 a term for each child, was devised because although the school had sports clubs there was no specific focus on healthy living.
Liz Clark, school nursing team leader and one of the originators of the programme, says there were three main aims: to get the children physically active, to teach them that raising their heart rate for periods of time was beneficial and to involve them in devising healthy diets by collecting food packets.
She says, 'We planted salad, fruit and vegetables with the children and made a stir fry with them in the staffroom. They loved it. It is very much to do with the public health promotion role of school nurses, rather than just seeing children for health screening.'
Babs Wright says it is important that the programme is run by the school nursing team because it has strong links with other health professionals within the PCT and can refer children to them if necessary.
She says the initial plan was to target certain children, but without stigmatising them. However, word about the fun activities of the club spread so it became increasingly popular and has now been opened up to the whole school.
Ms Wright realised the impact of the programme when children completed a questionnaire and indicated how much they had learnt about the importance of a healthy lifestyle.
Many of the children are from African families and she emphasises that sensitively securing the support of parents has been a vital element of the success of the programme. 'We give very gentle advice to parents on diet.
It also gives them another way of looking at the important work done by school nurses,' says Ms Wright.
She says the programme, which is led by the school nursing team with a learning mentor attending occasionally, is also helping to promote the Healthier Schools initiative.
Case study
Improving school performance
The experience of Lea Manor High School and Community College vindicates the Government's claim that extended school status raises morale and educational standards.
In 2002 the Luton secondary school was languishing in 'special measures' - DfES-speak for a school that is underperforming. Three years on it has become a full-service extended school, developed full daycare and is poised to open a children's centre on site. There is also a possibility that a primary school could eventually be built there.
Deputy head John Salusbury, who previously worked as a social exclusion project manager, has been appointed as extended schools' co-ordinator and is enthused by the school's resurgence and the close ties it is forging with the local community. 'There is a buzz about the place. We are breaking down barriers and people are surprised at how buoyant the atmosphere is. We are certainly dispelling some myths,' he says.
Private provider After School Express (ASE) has supplied the nursery, with 300,000 from the Neighbourhood Nursery Initiative. It is currently run by Marcia Newman, who was asked to take on the role in addition to organising a holiday playscheme and after-school club. 'The demand for the nursery has surprised many people. We now have a waiting list,' she says. A new 62-place nursery will be housed inside the children's centre.
Mr Salusbury says the link with a private provider has worked well.
'Although ASE is a private company, we have had a service-level agreement with them. They look after their own management. I give them the room free, provide heating and lighting, and pay the rates,' he says.
The childcare theme in the school's extended provision is reflected in courses in child development and a foundation nursery nurse course.
Strong links with a diverse range of partners, from the local youth service to the East of England Arts Council, have been the key to the school's burgeoning provision, with a particularly close relationship with the Marsh Farm Trust, a New Deal for Communities' project that has aided access to a variety of funding streams.
The extended facilities now include a catering kitchen and a thriving hairdressing salon, which other local salons want to use as a training venue. 'It's a commercial salon and we have put a lot of effort into making it look realistic,' says Mr Salusbury. A new music technology room has also been built and, after a school trip to the Trinidad Carnival, the school is investing in a set of steel pans.
Useful tips
* The school and local community should consider creating a steering or management group. Link up with the local authority - not just the LEA - through the extended schools remodelling adviser.
* Carry out an audit of what community needs are and what the existing provision is to identify gaps. Schools can then be a funnel for information to parents.
* Develop a robust business model, especially for self-financing childcare.
The charity 4Children has a number of examples.
* Use funding creatively. Modest amounts can often be used to lever in more resources from regeneration, health and anti-poverty strands.
* Schools can use their direct capital funding for improvements and extensions to accommodate services which have an educational value, such as lifelong learning.
* Governing bodies should keep separate accounts for community activities to ensure that the costs incurred are fully covered by income from charges and kept distinct from the school's delegated budget.
* Schools should ensure that extended provision dovetails with the existing ingredients of their school improvement plans.
* Ensure that provision complies with the national care standards as educational premises do not necessarily meet them. Local authorities can help and provide examples of good practice.
* When setting charges, take account of the extra costs of a caretaker, use of utilities and equipment as well as staffing, management time and insurance if activities are delivered on a school site.
* Where other providers are using the school site to deliver services, responsibilities, minimum standards and quality criteria need to be laid down in written agreements with the school and/or local authority.
* Involve parents in planning and running activities, identifying ones they want themselves, such as parenting support, adult literacy and computer skills, and providing ongoing feedback on the extended provision.
* Local authorities, school bus operators and parents should work in partnership to develop school travel plans, especially in rural areas where transport links may be weak. LEA transport provision does not necessarily extend to additional activities such as study support.
More information
* The DfES extended schools website provides guidance on how to set up and manage extended provision as well as useful contacts and case studies at www.teachernet.gov.uk/extendedschools.
* The National Remodelling Team is at www.remodelling.org; tel: 0207 979 2850.
* The extended Schools Support Service (TESSS) provided by ContinYou is at www.continyou.org.uk/tesss; tel: 020 8709 9900 (London); 024 7658 8440 (Coventry); 029 2047 8929 (Cardiff).
* The charity 4Children offers advice on setting up and running childcare as a part of extended provision at www.4children.org.uk. It outlines a school action plan and has a range of advice leaflets covering many aspects of extended provision at www.4children.org.uk/schoolnotes.
* The Ofsted website (www.ofsted.gov.uk, tel: 0845 601 4771) provides information on the regulation and registration of childcare and includes reports on individual services that schools may want to offer.
* Building Learning Communities is a toolkit published jointly by the DfES and ContinYou that provides practical information and resources for developing the role of schools in the community. It can be downloaded from the Extra Community website at www.extracommunity.org.uk.
* Information on procedures for employing staff can be found at www.dfes.gov.uk/a-z and from the Criminal Records Bureau at www.crb.gov.uk.
* Details of how much to charge and how staff can be paid for out-of-school activities as well as governor responsibilities and regulations for governing bodies can be found at www.governornet.co.uk.
* The leaflet 'Accounting for VAT' on the extended schools website offers guidance on VAT and excise, and the Customs National Advice Service on 0845 010 9000 also provides guidance on schools' individual circumstances as well as the website www.hmrc.gov.uk.
* The National College of School Leadership (NCSL) has added a new optional module on leadership of extended schools to the National Professional Qualification for Headship. The NCSL has run a series of seminars in partnership with ContinYou for headteachers and senior school staff on the leadership of extended schools. Key issues raised will be further discussed at a seminar in October. It also runs a multi-agency team development programme, a national professional qualification for integrated centre leadership and a Learning to Lead in Communities pilot programme.
