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Now we have been right through the pyramid of schools, which will be your child's educational home for many years, let's look a little deeper in to one of the services they all provide through a central coordinator.

Extended Services - what is it?

In 2004 the Government passed the Children's Act, part of which formally laid out five key targets which were to be considered an absolute right for every single child in the country. Those rights are now commonly referred to as "EVERY CHILD MATTERS" or ECM and every professional who deals with children at any level is tasked with upholding them and ensuring that everything they do is aimed towards the ECM guidelines.

The Governments web site for ECM states:
"Every Child Matters is a new approach to the well-being of children and young people from birth to age 19".
The Government's aim is for every child, whatever their background or their circumstances, to have the support they need to:

• BE HEALTHY
• STAY SAFE
• ENJOY & ACHIEVE
• MAKE A POSITIVE CONTRIBUTION
• ACHIEVE ECONOMIC WELL BEING

This is achieved by "joining up" the services already in place, adding new initiatives, including parents carers and families in learning and activities, supporting parents and carers in their roles and getting schools and communities closer together.

 

What has it achieved?

Over the last year thousands of pounds of extended service funding has been given to schools within the pyramid to improve service provision and more initiatives are in the pipe line ready to be rolled out soon. Dozens of existing before and after school clubs have received money to buy new equipment and open their facilities to more children.

Working with the Bedfordshire East Schools Trust (BEST), several schools now have fully operational school gardens, helping the children (and their parents) to learn about growing and eating healthy food. Award winning cheerleading clubs now exist at all three middle schools and at Samuel Whitbread.

Using extended services money, pupils from Samuel Whitbread Sixth Form now operate their own student counselling service, and they go out to lower schools to use their academic and life skills to help in the classrooms.

Professional adult counsellors are now available, via extended services, to all schools to help children, parents and carers cope with the problems of separation, bereavement, and anger management.

Schools are forging stronger links with their communities, involving them more closely and opening up their facilities for adult learning and allowing the community to access other services providers in the fields of health, community safety and family support.

For more information...

If you are a parent within the Samuel Whitbread pyramid and BEST, this website, or your school website, will keep you informed about what extended services are doing. To contact the extended services unit, please look at the "Contact Us" section of this site.

If you live outside Central Bedfordshire, and have come to this site for information, signposting to other information sources or just for a look around, you can find out more about extended services in your area and at your child's school by either going to your local council's website, and looking for the extended services section or by contacting your school and asking for the contact details of either your local extended services manager or the county extended services department.

Other Websites

For more information using the web, try the Government's website: Every Child Matters (ECM)

For more information on extended services try the teachers' website: TeacherNet

or the Training & Development Agency site: Training and Development Agency for Schools

The Department of Children, School's & Families produces an informative leaflet explaining the aims and goals of extended services and this is reproduced in this section for your information.