If you have a question about the Oldham JAR that is not listed below please email us.
1. What is the JAR?The Joint Area Review (JAR) will judge how well Oldham Council and its partners are delivering the key outcomes of the Every Child Matters framework. Every Child Matters is about how the Council and other agencies help every child in the Borough to:
The JAR is an inspection of the whole range of services provided by the publicly funded agencies and organisations that together make up Oldham Children’s Trust. It replaces the separate inspections of local education authorities, social services, connexions and provision for 14-19 year olds.
The JAR also assesses and makes judgements on the quality and management of our services and the capacity to improve. The JAR will consider what we are achieving and identify what we can change to improve the outcomes that children and young people achieve.
Yes. All 150 local authorities in the country will have had a JAR inspection by December 2008.
The JAR inspections are carried out by multi-disciplinary teams from at least four different Government Inspectorates and Commissions including:
The JAR process is well underway and there is an awful lot of work to be done by all partner agencies to continue improving services and to prepare for the inspection following the tentative feedback received during Analysis Week.
Current activity has involved the production of a detailed action plan to co-ordinate response to areas for further exploration, including evidence gathering. In addition, we have scheduled a number of briefings for staff and partners; general briefings for everyone; briefings that are more specific for those directly involved; and individual support for those being interviewed. We are also developing a fact pack covering a number of issues identified for further exploration and working on a complex fieldwork schedule for 15-26 September, when the inspectors will be back in Oldham.
During that time, inspectors will undertake their fieldwork activities, including interviews and focus groups at the Council offices and in other service area locations. They will interview front line staff, managers and councillors, visit services and talk to children and parents/carers about services. The views of children and young people who receive services and their parents/carers will be a significant part of the JAR.
The following are the full list of key dates relating to Oldham’s JAR:
Other key dates:
All individuals, organisations and agencies that provide services to the children and young people of Oldham have an important role to play.
All partners on the Changing for Children Executive Board of Oldham Children’s Trust are heavily involved in the JAR process and together hope to achieve a very positive JAR grade.
However, Oldham Council’s Children, Young People and Families Directorate is responsible for working directly with the inspectors.
A natural outcome of the JAR will be an increased strength in our partnership approach to the achievement of positive outcomes for all our children and young people. We will continue to:
If you are involved in planning, commissioning, delivering or providing support for services to children and young people and their families, the JAR affects you.
You could be involved in a number of ways:
The inspectors have asked to speak to councillors, children and young people, parents/carers, voluntary groups and any others who are involved in providing or receiving services. There are various planned visits with the inspectors but they are also free to turn up at locations with little or no notice.
Prior to Analysis Week, the inspectors had undertaken wide ranging pre-inspection planning and whilst on site between 21-25 July had access to Oldham intranet and internet sites. They may have looked at your service/organisation’s website or have contacted your service without disclosing who they were.
The inspection team will want to meet formally with a broad spectrum of those who work with children and young people - so it could be you!
There will also be additional support and briefings for colleagues who are likely to be interviewed and these will take place prior to the inspection.
If you are interviewed by inspectors be positive and constructive. The team will test your knowledge of your service and how it contributes to the Every Child Matters outcomes. There is a lot of good work going on which you and your service are likely to be involved in and there are many examples of effective practice that we should both share and promote with the inspectors.
We will also be making regular updates to the website, carrying out briefings and issuing newsletters to keep you informed about the JAR process, developments and latest news so please find time to read them, just in case!
If you are not involved in a formal meeting, you may still meet the inspection team on an informal basis. This could be in your normal work setting, or perhaps when the team visit an extended school, children's centre or local neighbourhood.
Children and young people’s views and experiences will be at the heart of the JAR process and will be used to inform the inspectors’ judgements.
Their views will be gathered at every stage of the review using a range of methods including:
The JAR inspectors will make graded judgements based on their findings. These will include:
The inspectors will also investigate:
No formal grading will be applied to these investigations.
The inspectors will also be looking to find evidence that all publicly funded services/organisations - including the police and health authorities, voluntary, community and faith sectors in Oldham - work together to assess need, identify priorities, agree resource availability, commission or deliver services and manage the performance of services.
The inspectors will use the new Children and Young People Plan (CYPP) as their guide to identify what priorities we have set ourselves in Oldham. In July, they looked at a wide range of other key documents and supplementary evidence, including the National School Survey and Tell Us 3 Survey, and completed a detailed tracking exercise of around 80 case files relating to 10 randomly selected childen and young people from the list of 100 that was submitted in May.
In September, the inspection team will undertake fieldwork visits to a range of locations which include children’s centres, children’s homes, youth centres and schools, including those with extended service provision.
Oldham’s priorities for improving outcomes for children and young people in the Borough are called The Oldham Six.
In addition, we have agreed a further set of priorities as a subset of the Oldham Six with Government Office North West (GONW) arising from national areas of concern and the findings from our most recent Annual Performance Assessment that will act as the starting point for the JAR.
The inspection contains the following elements:
The outcomes for children and young people will be measured using the same indicators in every area. They include public health data, educational statistics and information about crime, leisure activity, and housing. The inspection team will be sensitive to the local context when analysing the significance of various indicators and will identify trends where possible.
The inspection team will grade the contribution of local services in improving outcomes for children and young people within five categories: safeguarding, looked after children, learning difficulties and/or disabilities, service management and capacity to improve. The grades are:
Grade 4 – Outstanding: a service that delivers well above minimum requirements
Grade 3 – Good: a service that consistently delivers above minimum requirements
Grade 2 – Adequate: a service that delivers only minimum requirements
Grade 1 – Inadequate: a service that does not deliver minimum requirements
They will also grade the capacity of services to improve on the same scale.
The inspection gives us a real opportunity to show what we do well for children and young people whilst being very clear about where we need to improve.
Knowing that we will be inspected gives time for each and every one of us to be very clear about our ambitions for the children and young people of Oldham and our vision for services.
It is important to remember that we are not making improvements and sharpening our practice because the inspectors are coming. It is our role, responsibility and duty to make the lives of Oldham’s children and young people better by continually improving and developing our services – the inspection gives us an opportunity to see an accurate and holistic picture of how our services impact the lives of all our children and young people, particularly those that are most vulnerable.
The JAR will take place at the same time as the Corporate Assessment (CA) of the Council. The CA examines how the Council works with its partners to deliver services and improve outcomes for local people. The outcomes of the JAR will feed into the Council's Corporate Assessment.
The Corporate Assessment will look at:
The Corporate Assessment score will include judgements from the JAR inspection, in particular the judgments made of service and performance management.
The Annual Performance Assessment (APA) looks at how well the Council’s Children, Young People and Families Directorate is improving outcomes for children and young people.
An important feature of the APA process is the self-assessment. In the year of the JAR, there will not be on on-site inspection for the APA. Rather, the findings of investigations from the JAR will feed into the APA evidence base.
Inspectors will analyse the dataset outlining our most recent validated performance (2007-2008), briefings and any other information, complete the assessment record and write the draft APA letter which - after a number of quality and consistency checks - will be sent to us for a factual accuracy check in November.
There is then an opportunity to respond to the findings prior to the final letter and grades being published in mid-December 2008.
NOTE: 2008 is the final year for CPA, APA and JAR. The new Comprehensive Area Assessment will be introduced in 2009.
The JAR is also aligned with the inspection of the Youth Offending Service (YOS) managed by Positive Steps Oldham. This was recently undertaken by HMI of Probation in July.
The purpose of the programme is to report to the Secretary of State and, through him, Parliament and the public, on the effectiveness of the youth offending services in fulfilling their statutory duties to prevent offending by children and young people, and thereby protect the public, whilst safeguarding their rights and promoting their welfare.
You can find out more about preparations for the JAR by keeping an eye on the JAR website where there is a latest news page which is updated regularly.
Dates of JAR briefings and events will also be featured on the website and a JAR newsletter called ‘Bee the Best’ is published monthly.
You should also look out for updates on what is happening within your own organisations and across Oldham Children’s Trust through your own communication channels within your organisation.
If you would like to contribute anything to the website, newslettersor future briefings, or have any questions or suggestions about the JAR please email jar@oldham.gov.uk, or call the Programme Manager Stella Probert on 0161 770 8731.