Strategic Proposal for
Children’s Centre & New Childcare Place Development
To be returned to Sure Start Regional Team in local Government Office
by 15 October 2003 at the latest
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Local Authority |
Isle of Wight –
Rural Proposal |
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Key contact (will
be responsible for all queries from Sure Start Unit) |
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Minimum reach
target by March 2006 from Sure Start Unit* |
In addition to
indicative targets |
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Indicative
revenue funding allocation from Sure
Start Unit* |
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Indicative capital
funding allocation from Sure Start Unit* |
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Target number of
pre school centre–based childcare places to be provided in the 20% most
disadvantaged wards by March 2006* |
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Actual number of
under 5 yrs centre–based childcare places you can provide in disadvantaged
wards by March 2006. |
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*These should be the
figures provided in the letter of 21 February 2003 from Naomi Eisenstadt that
set out your targets & allocations
Strategic Plan
Please outline:
·
The strategic
aims and objectives behind your proposals
·
How you are
reshaping services and
·
The key
partners you are involving in the development of children’s centres, including:
o
how do you plan
to develop /maintain links with Primary Care Trusts
o
voluntary
organisations and private providers
o
parents and
community representatives
·
Links to other
government initiatives e.g. extended schools, children’s trusts, neighbourhood
renewal, and rural regeneration.
·
If your area
includes rural wards in which children’s centre services are planned- what
flexibilities/adaptations to the children’s centre model are you proposing?
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Due to the rural geographical nature of the Isle of Wight it was felt
that to reach some of our most socially disadvantaged children and families
we should develop a mobile rural service. The services will be linked to the
proposed static Children Centres and act as outreach services to families in
small communities. We would like to offer targeted services to our village communities
where services for families are at present very limited. Public transport on the Isle of Wight is poor and expensive, and this
puts travel out of the reach of many on low incomes. We propose to use two mobile units, which could provide the base for
delivering services where a quiet confidential space is required but not
available in existing community buildings. Services such as Health visitor,
Speech and language therapy, Oral health programmes, Positive parenting could
all be delivered in this way. In addition we would like to use local village halls and community
halls to establish locally based services through a mobile peripatetic team.
The team would include a programme co-ordinator, input from a qualified
teacher, playworker, health visitor, speech and language programmes, Family
Information Zone, Mobile Toy Library, input from the Scrap store and Toy loan
centre, as well as outreach of the family support and health promotion
activities that will be provided through the static Children’s Centres. Where specialist services can not be taken out to the community a
link would be made to the Rural transport services so that families can have
better access to these services at an affordable price or if possible on a
free travel basis. Most of the communities we are planning to work with already have
early educational childcare usually five days a week. To ensure that we are
able to meet the 10 hours of full day care, we will work with local
childminders and with the proposed Children’s Centres to link parents to full
day care provision. Transport to get children to centres will either be
through the Centre’s own mobile service or through the rural transport
scheme. (Work on how this will operate needs to be discussed and included at
a later date once we know if the proposal is acceptable) Any parent or child attending a rural outreach centre will be given
information on additional services available through the static centre
nearest to them. If they need these services then transport to the main
centre will be organised or where possible the service would be brought to
the community. |
Please describe your commissioning
arrangements. How will you
ensure that centres meet the core offer and that the required integration
features are met? How will you ensure services are fully available to children
with disabilities? What contract monitoring arrangements will be set up?
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Centrally run and co-ordinated, the Mobile Children’s Centre will
work in partnership with the static Children’s Centres on the Island. By offering the opportunity to reconfigure existing services to
ensure that they are delivered within local community, the Mobile Children’s
Centre will become a resource available to different services in the public,
private and voluntary sector. Core offer will be met through a combination of locally based
facilities, such a childcare integrated with daycare, and peripatetic
services, many of which are already delivered to the families in these rural
areas from a central location, and so are less accessible. By adding existing
services to the peripatetic suite; modelled on services being delivered from
the Static Children’s Centres, it is hoped families in rural and isolated
areas will be offered enhanced access to services. As an extension of static Children’s Centres, the monitoring and
evaluation processes for these will be extended to incorporate the Mobile
provision. The vehicles themselves will be selected to ensure that they are
accessible to all, including those with disabilities. Local venues, such as
village halls and existing childcare settings are subject to the Disability
Discrimination Act 1995, and we will ensure that settings and service
providers are aware of their responsibilities under this Act. |
Capital Plans. Please outline your project management arrangements to ensure
developments are completed in time for children’s centres to be operational by
March 2006.
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The purchase and furbishment of appropriate vehicles will be carried
out alongside a survey of villages and rural hamlets. Work with existing
service providers such as Health Visitors (and static Children’s Centres as
they come on line) and locally based community spaces such as village halls
will ensure that services can be delivered through the mobile Children’s
Centre in a timely manner. Managed centrally, by officers with experience and skills in project
management, it is anticipated that the service will be launched successfully
alongside the static Children’s Centres and will be delivering a full service
to rural communities on the Isle of Wight by March 2006. |
Social Inclusion Strategy. Please describe your social inclusion strategy for Children’s Centres,
demonstrating how you will:
- prioritise and plan inclusive services
for minority ethnic families
- consult with families from all ethnic
groups in area served by centre.
- implement culturally appropriate
services
- ensure staff in centre represent
cultural mix of local community.
This strategy should
include measure to ensure that babies and young children from minority ethnic
families have the equal opportunity to flourish at home and when they get to
school.
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The Isle
of Wight Council is committed to equal opportunities and inclusion, embracing
diversity as an underpinning to the Isle of With Corporate plan. Following
the Disability Discrimination Act 1995 and the Race Relations (Amendment) Act
2000, the Island recognises equality of access and service delivery as
increasingly important, and is mainstreaming equality and inclusion issues
into all stages of planning and delivery of services through the Equality
Standard for Local Government. In the
positive promotion of social inclusion, the Isle of Wight is resolved to
ensure that everyone, regardless of race, gender, age, sexuality, disability
or marital status has an opportunity to maximise their potential, so that
they can fully participate in society and Island life. It is committed to focus on the needs of
people who are likely to be disadvantaged, which include: §
Disabled
people and children §
Women §
People from
ethnic minorities §
Carers and
people responsible for children and other dependants §
People on low
incomes, people with minority religions or cultures §
Young people §
Older people §
Sexual
Orientation §
People with
HIV, drug dependency or who have mental health problems §
People with
learning difficulties §
The rurally
isolated They are
committed to their partners in Early Years, in the promotion of positive
learning experiences and celebration of cultural diversity, and seeks to work
with childcare providers to co-ordinate and deliver high quality early years
provision for all. Through the
Education and Community Development Strategic Plan and with its partners, the
Isle of Wight seeks to promote learning that is accessible to all, regardless
of ethnicity, culture or physical, social and intellectual attributes and
ability to pay. It recognises the
need to identify, challenge and break down discriminatory barriers by the
implementation of the Isle of Wight Equality and Diversity policy, which
identifies that inclusion and equality are common themes in their objectives
for Island regeneration. ·
The Early
Years Development and Child Care Partnership is committed to these
principles. ·
It will be a
requirement of all Centres and Services offered to families to comply with
equal opportunity legislation and the SEN Code of Practice. ·
Adoption of
Recruitment and Employment practices which ensure equal opportunities for
employees and candidates. ·
Early
Education settings currently sign an agreement which includes a commitment to
inclusion and compliance with the Early Years Partnership’s equal
opportunities policy. ·
This will
form part of the Memorandum of Understanding between the new Centres and the
LEA. ·
Centres will
need to demonstrate that they offer specific and targeted services where
appropriate to meet the needs of children and their families, i.e. §
individual
development/family plans for children with additional needs; §
bi-lingual
support services, ESL group/classes, bi-lingual information; §
information
available in video or taped formats; §
accessible
and user friendly buildings and playrooms reflecting diversity and cultural
and linguistic backgrounds. §
support for
the Socially excluded §
a translation
service and ESL support §
sensitive
responses to enquiries from FIZ §
bi-lingual
learning resources, such a library resources. Families
will need appropriate information and will be consulted about the most
effective services for them. The Island, through SureStart Ryde, has a team
of experienced parents and community members, who have received formal
training and have carried out a number of successful community consultation
exercises, which have lead to the development and delivery of services for
the Ryde community. It is anticipated that this model of good practice can be
duplicated for other areas of the Island. |
Planned spending profile
|
|
2003/4 |
2004/5 |
2005/6 |
Total £ |
|
Revenue |
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£145,000 |
£150,000 |
£295,000 |
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Capital |
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£55500 |
£500 |
£55,550 |
Number of children you plan to
reach through children’s centre services
|
2003/4 |
2004/5 |
2005/6 |
Total Number |
|
|
200 |
750 |
950 |
|
Year
1 Approx 8 site visits per week by 1 units Rolling 3 week rotation to sites So each site will get 4 visits during the
last 3 months of the year (Jan to March 05) Approx 25 children served at each site over
4 visits = 200 children in 2004/05 |
Year
2 Approx 15 visits per week by 2 units Rolling 3 week rotation Each site will get 15 visits per year Approx 50 children served at each site over
15 visits = 750 Children in 2005/06 |
Total new day care places created (either in
children centres or other settings)
|
2003/4 |
2004/5 |
2005/6 |
Total Number |
|
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10 Extended to
core offer hours |
20 Extended to
core offer hours 15 New CM places |
45 |
Summary of Individual Centre Proposals
(please copy and complete this table for each proposed centre)
No individual
setting will be a Centre – locations of visits by Mobile Children’s Centre will
be determined through survey of existing provision, demographics,
socio-economic indicators and local consultation