Maintaining quality in challenging times: options for the future. Dr. Lesley Curtis (Headteacher) and Jamie Wilson (Deputy Headteacher) of Nursery School and Family Centre and National Teaching School (known as the North Teaching School Partnership) since April 2013. Maintaining quality in challenging times! Set the scene re who we are.. Brief reminder re historical context for Nursery Schools re quality.. Recent documents that reference Nursery Schools.. What is quality in Nursery Schools and how can we maintain it? Options for the future.. Develop a toolkit for Nursery Schools to support sustainability? Where next re 5 years and 10 years time? What is quality to you in a Nursery School? What does quality look like? How can we promote quality more and move away from the term childcare? What are our blockers for enabling all to see that quality exists in Nursery Schools? How can we re-invent ourselves without losing quality? Remember Starting with Quality (Rumbold Report 1990) and the House of Commons Report (Educational Provision for the Under Fives 1988-89). Recommendations then had a focus on quality and also noted the range of provision for children under five years of age. We have come a long way in a short period of time but our quality is being compromised due to our cost which is impacting on our sustainability! So what do we do?

Our work has developed from a traditional Nursery School with links to Sure Start (2000), to an Early Excellence Centre in 2001 through merging with social services day nurseries to evolve as a Nursery School with a Children’s Centre (2003). We have recently changed the Children’s Centre team to an Early Intervention team. The site has developed since 1998 and has had the opportunity to explore how young children learn at a deeper level. We are a 104 FTE Nursery School, with 4 classes of 26 FTE of Nursery aged children. We have a daycare provision for 0-3 year olds which has recently been extended to accommodate more 2 year olds. At present we have 80, 2 year olds on-site! We have reduced our birth to 2 provision to 3 days and have nine 0-2’s per day. We have a Children’s Centre on-site which works with the children and families of the Everton ward area. We reach 800 families in the area with children under 5 years of age. _ The North Liverpool Teaching School Partnership is a collection of five schools that are all situated in north Liverpool and work in partnership with a number of strategic partners.

_ Everton Nursery School and Family Centre is the lead school and works in partnership with: - Barlows Primary School and and Children’s Centres - Our Lady Immaculate Catholic Primary School - The Beacon of England Primary School - All Saints Catholic Primary School and Children’s Centre _ Together, we work in partnership with Liverpool Local Authority and three HEIs: - Liverpool John Moores University - Liverpool Hope University - University of Cumbria Also work with Merseyside and Cheshire and Greater Manchester consortium The staff team has grown from 16 to 60 since my headship began in January 1999. We have a distributed leadership team of a Deputy Headteacher, Early Intervention Co-ordinator, Business Manager and Site Manager who support me in leading the Nursery School and Family Centre. All leadership team members have staff that they line manage and performance manage in their teams. Our work over the last 15 years has included developing and extending our environmental education programme. Through previous Early Excellence monies we developed our outdoor area and developed a programme to sustain our work. We have an environmental education teacher that works with us one day a week and a gardener plus an Eco Committee who organise events with children and families. We have recently gained the Ambassador Award for the North West with Keep Britain Tidy and have gained 4 green flags. All staff are family workers (key workers) and are responsible for the family as well as the child. We play a key role in family support and family learning. We have an early intervention programme to support families from moving into targeted support by providing a range of prevention strategies and for families to access parenting courses such as the Incredible Years programme. We transition children into approximately 25 primary schools within the city, with some children moving to specialist provision. We also transition children to neighbouring local authorities. We lose approximately 60 children per year. Our budget has been challenged in recent years through single formula funding and through primary schools offering places to our children before the end of the academic year. Taking more 2 year olds has been an opportunity to support our sustainability. We have a developed a range of resources to celebrate and share our work on outdoor learning, environmental education, schema, heuristic play and treasure baskets, Forest Schools. At present we are working on the mini misp (massage in school programme) with 2 and 3-4 year olds which is fascinating. See our website for more details re www.evertonnurseryschoolandfamilycentre.org Strengths of the North Liverpool Teaching School Partnership

_Early Years focus _Core primary subjects focus: Literacy and Mathematics _Integrated provision and working models: four Children’s Centres within the partnership _ITT _CPD _Research and Development _Environmental Education: Eco Schools Ambassador School for the north west _Faith education across the partnership _Leadership and Management _Trust and a long-standing history of working collaboratively Aspirations of the North Liverpool Teaching School Partnership

_ To make a significant impact upon Early Years and Primary teaching and learning _ To be successful across the Big 6 _ To work collectively as a partnership for the best interests of children’s learning, development and education _ To enable all teachers and practitioners to access high quality CPD across both Early Years and Primary education _ To engage teachers and practitioners to engage in innovative and meaningful research and development projects _ To grow and nurture ‘leaders for tomorrow’ _ To join up Early Years settings – regionally and nationally

What are our options for the future?

Links to School Direct – two types for Early Years! Links to Teaching Schools re SLE Foundation Stage and Family Support, Research, School to School support CPD and Training role? Link to PVI? Links to Ofsted and HMI re Inspector role? The House of Commons Education Committee (December 2013) Foundation Years: Sure Start Children’s Centres states; “The Department for Education needs to ensure the survival of maintained nursery schools and encourage the development of the network of nursery schools with children’s centres throughout the country”. “It has been a retrograde step to remove the requirement to have a qualified teacher in every centre”.

Nursery Schools always seem to be climbing to prove their worth? Recent reports over the last four years have acknowledged Nursery Schools but also recognise other providers and provision. This in turn has created competition with the private sector and with the maintained sector re primary schools. Research too acknowledges Nursery Schools (EPPE) but no government wants to endorse the future sustainability of the Nursery School.

So, where will Nursery Schools be in:

5 years time?

10 years time?

The pace of early years and education within schools is moving fast!

How can Nursery Schools keep up to sustain? What do we need to challenge? All decisions for the future of Nursery Schools and Nursery Education should be about quality. Unfortunately, cost seems to be used instead of quality. This in turn will have an impact on the quality. Drawing back to the 1988-89 report: “Quality depends on adults and the quality of their training, how they interact with children and quality language enrichment”. How can we work together to persuade others of the quality Nursery Schools have? Contact details

Everton Nursery School and Family Centre Spencer Street Liverpool L6 2WF

Tel: 0151 233 1969

Email: [email protected]

Web: www.northliverpoolteachingschool.org