Anexo 3

Summary of findings

Beyond the benefits already identified as a result of co-location and locality working, there was strong buy-in from partners at a strategic level and, in particular, actions were taken to encourage a closer relationship with schools at the frontline. Although there are still teething issues emerging with the school link roles (which are still in the process of bedding in), there are positive signs that schools welcome this support, and that this model has the potential to make the process of receiving referrals into children’s services from schools more effective.

Strategic partnerships

Since Stockport Family’s implementation, there has been a high level of buy-in to the programme from partners at a strategic level. Strategic partners from Education, Health and Police have expressed a strong understanding of the aims and objectives of the programme, and have spoken of their support for the attempts to improve early intervention with families:

“I am an observer; I think it’s quite interesting. … I also have a lot of admiration for what they have achieved so far. When you are in the midst of it, it is sometimes hard to see how far you’ve travelled down the road. I think they have made a huge amount of progress in terms of putting it together.” (Partner, Safeguarding)

"For me it seems far, far better…once you start to create an atmosphere where health, education and social care are working as part of a team...when there's a more joined up ownership...you get a lot more done." (Strategic staff)

Strategic staff in Stockport tended to be the most aware of this support from partners.

Nonetheless, there was strong positivity from staff surveyed about relationships with partner agencies. Nine out of ten (89%) staff either strongly, or somewhat, agreed that effective partnership working with other agencies was supported by their organisation, with 48% of staff surveyed strongly agreeing – an increase from 30% who strongly agreed in 2015:

“It is very exciting to work with colleagues that think the same way and have the opportunity to move away from silos and rigid thresholds. Without these partners on the Innovation Board there could have been a block.” (Strategic staff)

Strategic staff highlighted the involvement of seconded head teachers and other partners (representing health, police and education) as part of the Stockport Family Innovation Board. Strategic staff perceived this to have helped to inform the initial stages of the model’s implementation, and to secure buy-in from partner agencies. Receiving this direct input from partners on to the Board was seen to be important in building the overall

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credibility and legitimacy of the Stockport Family model. Additionally, it was hoped that a closer working relationship with universal services (such as education and police), at a strategic level, would translate into a greater willingness for collaboration between services at the frontline:

“In terms of the Stockport Family model, I’m clear in my head that this is very much about reducing interventions further along the line, because the intervention that’s needed has been put in place early. … There have been regular dialogues with children’s services, and opportunities for us to input. There is a collective corporate willingness for this to succeed.” (Partner, Education)

Team around the School programme

A core aim of Stockport Family Model is to forge deeper social care links with schools and education professionals, enabling earlier intervention and targeted short-term pieces of work with children and their families. One of the main activities undertaken to bolster partnership working in Stockport has been the introduction of the Team around the School (TAS) programme. The TAS programme aims to co-ordinate health and social care services, working together with schools, to offer support to children and their families within their schools and communities.

From June 2016 every school in Stockport was assigned a linked social worker, who acted as a point of contact with the school, to provide advice and guidance, support referrals, and assist with the completion of Early Help Assessments (EHAs). The role remains under development, influenced by the design-by-doing approach. Alongside the linked social workers, named School Age Plus Stockport Family workers also work in every school, working closely with school staff and the linked social worker to identify and support families who are in need of additional support. It was hoped that these

developments would lead to ongoing improvements in relationships with schools. By providing schools with more support through TAS meetings, staff felt that schools were becoming able to more easily identify the appropriate services to have conversations with when issues arise:

“[Schools are] really pleased that they’ve got this team of people who’ve got this range of experience, knowledge and skills in a form that can triage and get the best service to that child.” (Stockport Family worker)

“Team around the School meetings have helped everyone to come together. We use those to establish what is needed and what is required for the students and families.” (Stockport Family worker)

The programme is still at an early stage; however, there are reports of positive experiences from both social care and education teams. The school staff who were interviewed gave universally positive feedback on the role of the Stockport Family

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workers, and the workers themselves reported feeling supported and motivated to work with families. These workers were able to quickly build good relationships with schools in which they were based. They are regularly available and visible, with a dedicated time allocation, leading to fewer referrals to children’s services.

Some staff working directly with schools were concerned about how the requirements of this aspect of their role sat alongside their other tasks. Linked social workers, in

particular, were conscious of how school work was managed alongside their existing caseload. Because schools were enthusiastic about receiving input and guidance from social workers, they sometimes made more requests for support than it was possible for staff to respond to, requiring careful management of expectations:

“I see theoretically it’s a good approach and that it will work over time [but]

sometimes I think ‘how am I going to manage to find time for this school when I’ve got so much more to do?’” (Social worker)

Part of the challenge for social workers was the flexible nature of their responsibilities as a linked worker. Because the role was developed using the design-by-doing approach, there was no defined job specification for staff acting as named workers with a school.

Some staff welcomed the opportunity to take ownership of developing this role alongside their school. Others would have preferred to have a clear brief for the role, allowing them to focus on set activities, rather than needing to judge for themselves³⁰ the appropriate balance between their school link duties and their case work:

“On a positive note [design-by-doing] gives us flexibility… It depends on the individual worker and the schools to negotiate and that goes back to the worker's confidence, skill, and understanding.” (Social worker)

Given the perceived success of the Stockport Family workers linked to schools, and the aforementioned perceptions that social worker caseloads were high, it will be important for Stockport to clarify the role and remit of linked social workers as soon as possible, to establish clear boundaries and manage partner expectations.

30 Building on these findings, the remaining practitioner researcher is currently developing a project to explore the newly introduced Team around the School programme activities in one of the localities. This will build on the work conducted by the MMU embedded researchers in schools during the scoping stages of the evaluation.

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