Oldham Metropolitan Borough Council

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How the JAR will affect you

How the JAR will affect you

If you are involved in planning, commissioning or delivering services to the children and young people of Oldham then the JAR affects you.

You could be involved in a number of ways:

• Providing information about your service in preparation for the inspection or during the inspection
• Providing documentation to explain a policy or a service which is available to children or young people
• Providing information about our performance against one of the indicators which measures the impact of our services
• Attending a meeting or focus group with inspectors
• Being visited by inspectors at your place of work

The inspectors will want to speak to a range of staff including those from frontline services, middle managers and senior managers from the Children, Young People and Families Directorate and from our partner organisations.

We will contact the staff concerned once we know who the inspectors want to speak to and a detailed schedule of meetings will be produced. Additional meetings may be requested during the course of the fieldwork fortnight. If you are to be included in this, you may be asked to attend a meeting at very short notice.

Guidance and support will be given to everyone who will be interviewed by inspectors and a guide for JAR inspection interviewees offering advice will be developed over the coming months.

Even if you do not take part in a meeting or focus group, you might be asked to support colleagues who are, or to be involved in helping to prepare evidence or collecting supporting data for the inspectors.

Who else the inspectors will talk to

The inspectors will be speaking to councillors, children and young people, parents/carers, voluntary, community and faith groups and any others who may be involved in providing or receiving services. There are various planned visits with the inspectors but they are also free to turn up to locations with little or no notice. View the inspectors' fieldwork activity.

The results of the recent inspection of the Youth Offending Service which took place week commencing 28 July will also feed into the JAR. See links to other inspections.

How you can prepare for the JAR

The inspection gives us a real opportunity to show what we do well for children and young people, whilst being very clear about what we need to do improve their outcomes.

In preparing for the inspection, you should think about how you would respond to possible questions the inspectors might ask and what you could show them as evidence. These might include:

About you / your area

• Can you tell me about your role / key areas of responsibility?
• What is life like for children and young people growing up in the area?
• In your opinion how well has change in Children’s Services been managed?

About your service

• What services are you responsible for?
• Who uses your service?
• What need does your service meet? How was this need identified?
• How does your service / service outcomes fit with the Children and Young People Plan?
• Towards which Every Child Matters outcome(s) does your service contribute?

Overall achievement and outcomes

• What are you/your service’s current ambitions, priorities and plans?
• How do these relate to those in the Children and Young People Plan?
• What does your service do well and how do you know?
• How are you making progress against the changes that need to be made for children and young people in this area?
• How do you know?
• What does your service see as its challenges?
• What are you doing about them?
• How effective are your partnerships working?
• How effectively do you safeguard children and young people?

Involvement and engagement

• How does your service involve parents, carers and young people in service planning and evaluation?
• How do you listen and respond to the voice of children and young people?
• What do children and young people think about your service?
• How do you know?
• How are you supporting vulnerable children?
• How have you improved outcomes for vulnerable children and young people?
• How do you know?
• How are you addressing equality and diversity?

Other useful tips in preparing for the JAR

• Talk about the JAR in your team meetings so that everyone knows what is involved, what to expect and is thoroughly prepared
• Attend the general briefing session for all staff AND the more specific briefing sessions if you are directly involved
• Cascade information to your team
• Keep up-to-date with information by regularly visiting the JAR web pages, attending any briefings and reading the JAR newsletters
• If you are directly involved, read the briefing notes that relate to your service/organisation’s involvement and consider how we meet the key judgements and what further evidence you might be required to produce
• Inspect your own service area: what would inspectors see if they visited? Is it what you would want them to see? Is your office environment tidy and organised and all posters around your desk appropriate?
• Continue to collate evidence that demonstrates the positive contribution your service makes to the lives of children and young people
• Ensure there will be full representation within your service around the time of the inspection.
• Raise any queries/concerns about the JAR with the JAR Project Team  or your line manager – if you think it’s a concern, it probably is
• Respond quickly to any requests from the JAR Project Team. If we ask for something, we need it.

Every Child Matters:

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