Draft ‘Belonging Strategy’ unveiled to improve pupil attendance and engagement

Alec Doyle, Local Democracy Reporter

A new ‘Belonging Strategy’ for improving attendance and engagement at schools in a north Wales county has been unveiled by education bosses with the tagline ‘You are ours’.

The strategy is currently a draft proposal with a task and finish group working to get it ready for consultation. It has been devised by Flintshire County Council’s Education Department to try to tackle a number of problems around school attendance attributed to Covid.

These include pupil disengagement from education, challenging behaviours leading to exclusion, the need for additional learning provision for children with increasingly complex needs, emotionally-based school avoidance and pupils experiencing a range of mental health difficulties.

Overarching vision

The strategy aims to provide an overarching vision for the direction of pupil engagement in Flintshire – bringing together existing national and local strategies designed to increase engagement and improve attendance.

Working with headteachers, Young Flintshire and the Wrexham University Civic Mission Team, Flintshire’s Education Department took national data and research, and local feedback, and created a plan to improve pupil motivation, attendance and achievement through bolstering their sense of ‘belonging’.

Programmes like the Welsh Government’s Community Focused Schools grants and the implementation of the Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) InReach service will now be enacted with a strategic vision in Flintshire, to foster a greater sense of community between pupils and their schools.

Flintshire’s senior manager for inclusion and progression, Jeanette Rock, said that ‘belonging’ could have a powerful influence on pupils’ engagement.

“Change like Covid brings a feeling of trauma and not feeling safe,” she said.

“That’s where the importance of operating a system that supports belonging comes in. Everything is dependent on relationships. It’s about being proactive, responsive and showing you value that child.

“An important part of the feedback from Young Flintshire was what it felt like to belong and to not belong. That feedback was shared with headteachers at a conference we held for them to share the principles of belonging we are talking about and to ask them to share what they are currently doing in their school environments.”

‘Fantastic project’

Councillors in Flintshire’s Education, Youth and Culture Overview and Scrutiny Committee embraced the draft Belonging Strategy.

Flintshire Peoples Voice Cllr Carolyn Preece, representing Buckley Bistre West, said: “This is the most fantastic project. It brings together things different schools have been doing for years.

“This I think will work. Embedding this into everyday life, this will bring in so much. The impact will be fantastic.”

Caergwrle Labour Cllr Dave Healey agreed: “This report is a very valuable contribution.

“I think the concept of belonging hits the nail on the head. The quality of the relationships within an organisation are important. I hope we can see what this looks like in practice.”

Chief Officer for Education and Youth, Claire Homard, said the strategy would give pupils a feeling of security.

“It gives you a feeling of security when you feel that you belong,” she said. “It is a values-driven approach that is powerful for pupils and for members of staff too, who benefit from feeling like they belong to their community.”