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Growth and Change

CSF was set up in April 2001. It was the first public sector organisation to bring together education and social services to provide an integrated approach to provide the best possible levels of education, health and development for the 250,000 children who live in Hertfordshire.

Now, three years on, the service is developing a new framework to make sure it is in a strong position to respond to national proposals for the reform of children's services and the requirements of the Children's Bill.

The Children, Schools and Families Service is lead by the Director John Harris. Three strategic core functions, led by deputy directors, anticipate a shadow structure for the Hertfordshire Children's Trust Management Board, which we plan to have in place from 2006.

They are: -
Learning and School Effectiveness led by Deputy Director, Justin Donovan.
Commissioning, Performance and Resources led by Deputy Director, Lesley Brockington
Social Care and Prevention led by Deputy Director, Moira Swann.

Social Care and Prevention
CSF undertakes the functions for children of an authority with social services responsibilities. Social Care and Prevention brings together the range of services for vulnerable children and families to help them achieve their full potential.
It leads on the assessment, social support and care for children in need, fostering and adoption services, the provision of residential homes and respite care and support for all care leavers.
Multi-disciplinary teams deliver services locally, enabling staff to build up a detailed knowledge of the local area. The teams include social workers, educational psychologists, education welfare officers, community workers, family support workers and early years workers. The work includes;

• initial assessment of children in need, child protection investigations
• work with children who are out of school - ie truanting, excluded pupils, sick children
• assessment of children with special education needs
• work with disabled children - respite care, shared care and equipment etc.
• long term work with children in public care, e.g. in helping maximising educational achievement
• work with troubled adolescents
• advising teachers on child issues such as attendance, behaviour, special needs and child protection
• providing specialist advice and support to children who are looked after by the local authority, to those with physical and sensory impairments and those with autism and speech and language difficulties
• care leaving service to support young people who have received long term care make a successful transition to adulthood

Developing a new framework

As one of the first authorities to integrate children's service, Hertfordshire is now seeking to build on the significant progress it has already made, harness these benefits and further improve them.

The Growth and Change programme is challenging the way we do things, looking at how we can improve our systems and practices. We are seeking to improve the alignment between available resources and our priorities.

Preventative services are central to all of the work we do, seeking to provide support as early as possible, so that small problems are nipped in the bud and, wherever possible are resolved before they become large problems. The challenge is to make sure that this is embedded in all that we do.

There are four common principles underlying our preventative work, whether it is for vulnerable children, families, schools or whole communities.

• A holistic view of the child and her/his developmental needs
• Focus on early intervention
• Focus on building resilience - for schools and individuals
• Emphasis on multi professional working that's appropriate to need

Good progress has been made in developing multi-agency action plans. Our challenge is to develop the preventative capacity of universal services through:

• looking in more detail at the lessons learned from referrals in recent years.
• ensuring we have systems and protocols in place for early prevention and intervention
• improved information-sharing and joint working between agencies
• a common model of assessment across all professional groups

Proposals for a new framework for CSF have been drawn up. The final proposals will be presented to Hertfordshire County Council Cabinet in January, with a view to implementing the new plans from April 2005.