2. A note on community focused schools including examples of good practice of what makes a good community focused school.

The following summarises findings from inspections over the last five years in schools across Wales regarding partnership work between schools and their communities. Appendix 1 identifies best practice case studies that further illustrate the work of effective community-focused schools. Generally, schools place a high priority on developing and strengthening community links. Schools main purposes in establishing these links is to improve outcomes for pupils, particularly disadvantaged pupils, and also to provide services to the communities they serve. Schools that are successful in establishing effective community partnerships:

· Establish and implement a vision that places the school at the heart of the community

· Ensure the school has a welcoming ethos to all stakeholders, in particular parents and carers

· Create effective community engagement plans that focus on improving outcomes for pupils

· Use specific activities to improve educational outcomes and wellbeing, such as family learning projects and workshops to help parents know how best to help their children to improve key skills or in particular areas of the curriculum

· Engage with parents and carers of disadvantaged learners successfully to help them and their children to overcome barriers to learning and wellbeing

· Engage in ‘Team around the family’ approaches, using the pool of skills within the team to address the health, domestic and social welfare concerns of learners and their families

· Support pupils and their families well to engage with specialist services, for example when pupils have special educational needs. These often include educational psychologists, speech therapists and physiotherapists

· Identify specific challenges in their local areas and strengthen community links to tackle these. For example, raise attendance rates, improve behaviour, raise the level of parental support and reduce the incidence of vandalism

· Provide pupils with special educational needs with valuable opportunities to engage with their local communities to develop life skills

· Establish effective arrangements to provide care facilities before and after the school day, for example through breakfast club (usually primary schools)

The above approaches often have a positive impact on outcomes for pupils and for parents. These include:

· Improvements in pupil attendance

· Improved standards of behaviour

· Improved literacy and numeracy skills

· Improved parental capacity to support their child at school

· Improved relationships between parents and schools and between parents and their children

· Supporting parents to access education and employment to improve their family circumstances

· Supporting parents that are new to the country to find a ‘place’ in the community support their children successfully

· Enable parents to work in the knowledge that their children are well looked after before and after school

Estyn has produced several reports on pupil deprivation. The main findings of these reports are summarised in ‘Pupil Deprivation’ (Estyn, May 2014), which is available at:

https://www.estyn.gov.wales/sites/default/files/documents/Pupil%20deprivation.pdf

https://www.estyn.gov.wales/sites/default/files/documents/Pupil%20deprivation%20cy.pdf

The report notes that schools alone cannot break the link between disadvantage and achievement. Although the school has an important role to play in improving the achievements of disadvantaged learners, research stresses the need for broad-based approaches that involve a number of agencies working together to address community-based issues. In addition to the school, these include other educational, social and health services.

Some of the multi-agency strategies used by schools for this purpose are summarised in the following diagram from the report:

Appendix 1

Name of School	Case Study/inspection report	Link
Cefn Hengoed Community School, Swansea	A holistic approach to improving attendance	https://www.estyn.gov.wales/best-practice/holistic-approach-improving-attendance
Treorchy Comprehensive School	3.3 Partnership working	https://www.estyn.gov.wales/sites/default/files/documents/Treorchy%20Comprehensive%20School.pdf
Tredegarville Primary School, Cardiff	Effective partnerships that engage children and enrich the curriculum	https://www.estyn.gov.wales/best-practice/effective-partnerships-engage-children-and-enrich-curriculum
Ysgol Gynradd Gymraeg y Castell, Caerphilly	Improving outcomes for pupils receiving free school meals	https://www.estyn.gov.wales/best-practice/improving-outcomes-pupils-receiving-free-school-meals
Monkton Priory CP School, Pembrokeshire	Supporting adult learning and skills acquisition	https://www.estyn.gov.wales/best-practice/supporting-adult-learning-and-skills-acquisition
Ysgol Maesglas, Flintshire	Building partnerships with families	https://www.estyn.gov.wales/best-practice/building-partnerships-families
St Helen’s Primary School, Swansea	Engaging with parents to improve pupil attendance	https://www.estyn.gov.wales/best-practice/engaging-parents-improve-pupil-attendance-0
Garnteg Primary School, Torfaen	Working in partnership with parents to raise learner literacy and numeracy	https://www.estyn.gov.wales/best-practice/working-partnership-parents-raise-learner-literacy-and-numeracy
Severn Primary School, Cardiff	Finding new ways to widen pupils’ experiences	https://www.estyn.gov.wales/best-practice/finding-new-ways-widen-pupils%E2%80%99-experiences
Wrexham early years centre, Wrexham	Engaging and supporting parents and families	https://www.estyn.gov.wales/best-practice/engaging-and-supporting-parents-and-families

More case studies are available at www.estyn.gov.wales