 In this second issue, ESW Associate & Strategic Leader of Teaching & Research Schools (Education South West), Roger Pope CBE contemplates the DfE "hanging onto the tail of the Covid beast, struggling to respond to its latest twists and thrashings." In this final week of January - with the usual and additional challenges of this winter month - as "the bulb shoots are thrusting up through my lawn" he urged partners to "look for the positives!" Indeed we do. As well as some of the latest and forthcoming offers from our partner Teaching School Alliances, you can also read an update on our work with the Early Career Framework, and a year on, read the report on the RSHE Ready Secondary programme and more besides. If you would like to be added to the mailing list, email TSSW Project Co-Ordinator, Jude Owens.
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 It’s now a year since TSSW’s successful bid to lead the Department for Education training to support schools in readiness for the new Relationship, Sex and Health Education (RSHE) 2020 guidance. All State Secondary settings within our region could register to receive the following support package:
Despite the unforeseen Covid-19 lockdown situation and school closures, we have effectively and rapidly adapted our programme to be delivered remotely, using both video conferencing and webinars to support and train our partner schools. We have now recruited and trained ten secondary school RSHE Ready mentors to work one-to-one with schools; which included specialist training by Brook and fortnightly training during last Summer Term. We moved to remote training through webinar platforms and online meetings, with access to a dedicated website where all webinars can be accessed, along with training materials and in order to support sharing between partner schools we have developed a shared access drive. The PSHE Subject Leads Network has been significantly expanded and developed to meet the training needs of the partner schools, including:
It is rewarding to report that meetings have been attended by over 60 schools and the forthcoming PSHE Network meeting on Wednesday 3 February 2021 will be cross-phase and focus on teaching about drugs and alcohol. In the first two waves of the programme over 100 schools within our region have been supported with live webinars, access to recordings to all partner schools and up to half a day of dedicated support from an RSHE Ready Mentor, and this mentor support is on-going.  Next is the development of a Strategic PSHE Network in collaboration with Devon, Torbay and Plymouth Public Health, the University of Exeter, local 0-19 teams, Community Public Health Nursing, CAMHs, Mental Health Support Teams, Well-Being for Education Return and the Diocese Offices from across the South West.
100% of staff who responded to our post-training evaluation question rating the quality of the RSHE Ready training and support, rated us as High Quality. We also gathered the following data on the efficacy of our training for our Wave 2 partner schools: 37% rated themselves as having some, little or no knowledge of the RSHE Guidance before they started, on completion of the programme, 96% of partner schools that responded to our post-evaluation survey, rated their knowledge as high or expert. Before the programme confidence when we asked schools about delivering effective RSHE to meet the 2020 guidance: 3% of partner schools reported having some, little or no confidence. After the programme of training and support 96% of staff from our partner schools rated themselves as having high levels of confidence. Wave 3 is due to commence on Thursday 28 January 2021 and will run until the end of March. It is open to all secondary schools who have not taken part yet. Thank you to RSHE Ready (Secondary) Director, Lisa Whitworth for her report. At the heart of the Department for Education’s Teacher Recruitment and Retention Strategy is the commitment to transform support for teachers at the start of their career. TSSW are pleased to be working with national provider, Teach First to deliver this one-year version to 83 Early Career Teachers (ECT) and their mentors signed-up to the programme. The Early Career Framework (ECF) offers professional development support for Newly Qualified Teachers (NQTs) in the first two years of their career. It underpins an entitlement to a fully funded, *two-year package of structured training and support for teachers, linked to the best available research evidence. The package of reforms, funded by the DfE will ensure that new teachers have dedicated time set aside to focus on their development. *In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the first year of the ECF programme was made available to more schools to support a larger number of Early Career Teachers who may have had a disruption to their initial teacher training. Over the year, the ECT is involved in:
Mentors also attend a half-termly virtual CPD session where they have opportunity to meet other mentors and discuss aspects of the programme and their role. During the session they also receive further CPD on effective mentoring and core skills. To support the implementation of the programme, and the development of the Early Career Teacher, a Teach First or TSSW Development Lead (DL) has been assigned to work with schools and groups of ECTs. All of our Development Leads are experienced practitioners and experts in training teachers and deliver both the Early Career Teachers virtual CPD sessions and mentor training. The DLs are now working on Module 3 /6 with our ECTs and the programme has been well received so far. The engagement shown by schools, ECTs and mentors has been very encouraging, despite the continuing challenging circumstances presented by the national lockdown. National Roll-Out September 2021 As an organisation TSSW is proud to be in a position to support new teachers as they take their first steps in the profession and we are looking forward to playing a significant role in the national roll-out of the Early Career Framework (ECF) in September 2021. Being involved in the one-year programme has proved to be invaluable and will place us in a strong position to approach next year's roll-out confidently for the following reasons:
Next Steps TSSW will be running a number of early engagement events for schools at the end of the Spring Term/beginning of the Summer Term to prepare schools for the ECF roll-out. We can advise on time commitments, the structure of the programme and share how schools have approached its implementation this year and also identify pitfalls and barriers to success and suggest ways that these can be avoided. The events will also give advice on choosing mentors to support the ECTs. Following on from this in the Summer Term we will invite mentors to an early induction programme to prepare them for September and introduce schools to their Development Leads. If you’d like to know more, please contact Assistant Director of TSSW, Sarah Frame.  School Operations & Resource Management Network First Session | Thursday 25 February 2021 | 1000 – 1200 | Online School Business Managers/Administrators can book a place on the first session of the new School Operations & Resource Management Network, which is intended to provide support for School Business Managers to manage their operations/resources efficiently and effectively. Our aim is to ensure that colleagues benefit from industry sector knowledge, updates and ideas to enable them to be compliant and gain the most from available resources. This first session will include the following:
Cost | FREE for Primary & Secondary Teaching Schools South West (TSSW) member schools. Booking Instructions To book your place, click ‘Attend this event’ on the course booking page and then either login if you already have a profile or click ‘Register’ to create a new account. By creating a new account you can book onto a wide range of courses offered by TSSW and keep track of all the courses you have attended. 1. If registering, ensure all the fields with the red asterisk next to them are completed. 2. Next to the field ‘Registration Type’, ensure ‘Establishment member’ is selected. 3. Next to the field ‘Establishment’, choose the area your school is located in from the ‘Select an organisation area’ drop-down list. 4. Leave the ‘All sectors’ drop-down as it is. 5. Select your school from the ‘Select an establishment’ drop-down list. 6. Once completed, click the ‘Submit’ button (you may have to wait a short while for your account to be approved). 7. Once approved, login using the Username and Password you have created. 8. Complete the ‘Request a Place’ form.   ESW Associate & Strategic Leader of Teaching & Research Schools (Education South West), Roger Pope CBE contemplates molehills in a neighbouring field and the parallels in the world of education... "Right now, there are molehills popping up all over the school system too: the other 81 Teaching School Hubs are set to be announced shortly; then national ECF and NPQ providers; an ITT review has been launched; oh – and in the middle, up pops the new National Institute of Teaching..." You can read the first issue of our new TSSW Update newsletter here. Find out the latest information about offers and events across the Teaching School Hub and Teaching School Alliance partners and more besides. If you would like to be added to the mailing list, email TSSW Project Co-Ordinator, Jude Owens.
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