Equity & Excellence Leads
What are these roles?
“The role of equity and excellence lead is primarily focused on leading support for the most disadvantaged children to close the attainment gap.
This involves working directly with children and does not focus on managerial responsibilities e.g. administration and payroll.
Another key role is to lead and support pedagogy in a setting, upskilling fellow practitioners.
Leads are not tied to the settings’ adult-child ratios like other staff and therefore have greater flexibility and reflection time for this purpose. Local authorities have been given freedom to utilise leads depending on their local needs and the leads experience, therefore the roles focus may differ across settings.”
How do they support settings?
Equity and Excellence Leads provide additionality to staffing in settings where children are most at risk from the poverty related attainment gap. With a focus on early intervention these senior practitioners plan interventions and work directly with children and families to improve experiences and outcomes.
The following are examples of how Equity and Excellence Leads support settings:
Working with children
- Small group work to support development, e.g. ‘What’s in the Bag’, ‘Word of the Week’, ‘Emotions Talk’.
- One to one work as an additional support
Working with families
- Peep – Peep groups are for parents and carers and their young children – some are for babies, toddlers, pre-schoolers (3-5) or young school-age children, while others are for mixed age children. In Peep groups, practitioners and families share ideas and simple, low-cost activities that support children’s learning in everyday life – talking, singing, sharing books and playing together. They’re also a great way to get to know other families.
- PoPP – Triple P gives parents simple and practical strategies to help them build strong, healthy relationships and confidently manage their children’s behaviour and prevent problems developing.
Working with staff
- Data analysis – Developmental Overviews etc.
- Leading and facilitating training
- Supporting environmental changes.
- Supporting the development of continuous provision.
- Developing interventions based on gap identification.
