In my first blog I talked about getting out from behind the desk.  This week I haven’t seen my desk. I have travelled around 660 miles and have gained a huge amount of information about the change/improvement agenda in Scottish Education and how we are meeting the needs of our children and young people in Argyll and Bute during this fast moving change agenda.

On Monday I set off for Edinburgh to attend a meeting with Scottish Government and ADES to discuss the National Improvement Framework and the publishing of the data.  This meeting involved all 32 authorities discussing and reviewing data sets for the reporting of P1, P4, P7 and S3 literacy and numeracy levels.  This was a very informative and at times challenging afternoon discussing the way forward and the forthcoming publication of the data.

I stayed over in Edinburgh on Monday night and then back into the COSLA offices on Tuesday morning for a meeting in regard to the Governance review with COSLA and the Deputy First Minister John Swinney, again all 32 local authorities were involved and Argyll and Bute was represented by Cllr Rory Colville, Executive Director, Ann Marie Knowles and myself.  One of the main considerations was Local Authorities working together.  Presentations were given by some authorities who have established alliances to work together.  Mr Swinney was also very clear that the main focus for authorities and schools was closing the attainment gap.  This can only be achieved by improving the learning and teaching.  For the Scottish Government a clear strategy for this is improved collaboration by schools and authorities.

http://www.gov.scot/Topics/Education/thegovernancereview

On Wednesday I was in attendance all day at the Early Years Conference in Arrochar at the Three Villages Hall.  I was chair for the event which was titled Self Evaluation – We are on a Journey. The day was very good for networking and sharing.  The three speakers were Jean Carwood Edwards – Early Years Scotland, Stuart MacKenzie – Care Inspectorate and Xenia Dennison –NHS Highland.  A highlight for me was the input from practitioners who gave some real examples of self-evaluation in action.  These contributions came from Colgrain, Port Charlotte, Dalintober, Tarbert and Riverside Rascals.  I felt very proud of the work happening in the Early Years and delighted to have spent a positive day learning so much more about the difference being made in Argyll and Bute.  The new Learning and Development Framework which will support self- evaluation was also launched and presentations from the day will be made available on SALi.

https://blogs.glowscotland.org.uk/ab/sali/early-years/

The following is the message I left the group to consider.

Thursday saw me travelling to Rothesay Joint campus to attend the Secondary HT meeting.  The Secondary Head Teachers visit each other’s schools to share practice as part of their meeting.  The main area of practice shared was around the Health and Wellbeing agenda with support for young people.  We were delighted to have a presentation on the good work happening in Rothesay with regard to English as a second Language led by the Acting Deputy Head, Elaine Sullivan.  During the day some students from Rothesay also focused on their work with “On track to achieve” with the Dame Kelly Holmes Trust.  The support to self-confidence and achievement from this programme was very impressive.  I fully value this opportunity to work with my colleagues and we took some time during the business part of the day to focus on the raising achievement agenda and the commitment to moderation.

On Friday morning I was delighted to be a judge at the Youth Philanthropy Initiative (YPI) at Dunoon Grammar.  This was an amazing morning. The YPI gives Secondary School pupils a hands on experience of philanthropy that develops their skills and awareness in order to make a positive difference in their communities.  Pupils work with charity groups in their community and present about the work the group undertakes.  There is a £3000 award for the charity which is chosen.  The groups are required to present about their knowledge of the charity, passion and creativity of presentation.  I was delighted to say the job as judge was difficult but the judging panel (Brendan O’Hara, MP, Anne Paterson, Acting Head of Service: Education, Michael Russell, MSP, Natalie Randamy, Senior HR and Training Assistant at the Scottish Salmon Company, Sam Coley, Entrepreneur and ex-DGS Pupil, David Mitchell, Head Teacher, DGS) finally agreed to the Dunoon’s Mens Shed.

I have had some very good feedback on the weekly blog and have had suggestions that it would be useful to be able to add comments.  So if we have enabled the add comment feature of the blog and I look forward to hearing your views on the subjects I have been blogging about.