Extended Services

The work of our Extended Services Team supports schools in responding to The Children's Act through Extended Services and The Every Child Matters Agenda. The Children's Act encourages schools to extend beyond the campus and the school day to provide co-ordinated services for children and their families locally.

Our project supports schools in providing access to the Core Offer which underpins the intended outcomes of the Every Child Matters agenda which says that children and young people should have the opportunity to:

• Be safe
• Be healthy
• Achieve and enjoy
• Make a positive contribution to their community
• Achieve economic wellbeing

The aim is to bring together all those involved in working with families within a Cluster area, to facilitate communication, signposting and co-ordinate projects to help and support families. Cluster partners include schools, children's centres, Education Leeds, the Health Authority, Social Care, Early Years and representatives from the Voluntary, Faith and Community sectors.

The aim of the Extended Services Core Offer is to ensure that all children, young people and families have access to the following services if they want them:

• Local childcare from 8.00am to 6.00pm all year round
• A varied menu of activities including study support (after school and in school holidays)
• Parenting support, including family learning
• Swift and easy access to targeted and specialist services
• Wider community access to school buildings to include adult and family learning, ICT and sports etc

Learning Partnerships works across two clusters in the Inner City urban areas of Leeds and employs Cluster Managers in each of these areas:

One working in the South of the City which is made up of two Neighbourhood Clusters of schools, Children's Centres and their communities. The two Neighbourhood Clusters are 'Beeston Hill & Holbeck' and 'Belle Isle and Hunslet'.

Named 'JESS', this Cluster comprises of 13 Primary Schools, The South Leeds Academy, 5 Children's Centres and a wide range of statutory services and 3rd Sector organisations.

Work is also facilitated through Learning Partnerships in the Inner East Cluster of Leeds. This Cluster is made up of three neighbourhoods:

• Burmantofts and Lincoln Green assisting 5 Primary Schools and Primrose High Schools and 1 Children's Centre
• Gipton and Harehills assisting 5 Primary Schools and 2 Children Centres, and
• Richmond Hill neighbourhood which is supported through Renew assisting 4 Primaries and Mount St Mary's High School.

The role of the Extended Services or Cluster Managers is to work with statutory agencies and voluntary sector providers on a locality (neighbourhood) level and the Cluster level to enable access to the Extended Services Core Offer.

A team approach is used to facilitate and coordinate provision to assist families in the Inner East; developing partnerships to maximise the use of available resources and facilities to meet the needs of local communities.

The Cluster Managers:

• Work with the cluster's Family Support Workers (FSWs) to meet agreed cluster actions for parent/family support.
• Link with and signposts to accessible and safe 'Out of School Hours' and holiday activity programmes for children and young people in the cluster.
• Analyse school and neighbourhood data to inform cluster locality planning and responds to local and national agendas to ensure priorities are met.
• Link with other local services eg NHS, Area Committee and Education Leeds, to support the needs of the local community.

The Clusters are directed by the Leadership Teams made up of representatives from the services, agencies and partners in the Cluster.

The Inner East Cluster has identified a number of key priorities which are addressed through multi 'agency tasking groups'; Cluster Managers take the Lead on the work these address.

The priority areas supported through Learning Partnerships include:

• Inner East Community Cohesion Tasking Group – Lead: Dalia Gabay whose focus is to actively promote race equality and community cohesion and meet the needs of rapid changes in populations (including language support) across the cluster.
• Activities Fund – Lead: Susan Blackburn whose focus is to improve opportunities for children in Inner East through liaison with tasking groups to identify opportunities for support and development; coordination of activities and evaluation of their effectiveness.