East Devon
Hello Everyone,
Welcome to the news and events page for the East Devon area.
*NEW* Consultation Opportunity
Would you like to help improve how schools deal with parents’ complaints?
On 24 September, the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families announced an imminent consultation on a new way of handling parents’ complaints to their child’s school. The consultation will run for eight weeks, closing on 21 November. The Children’s Plan committed the Government to look at ways of improving the current arrangements for parents’ complaints. The consultation invites comments on handling parents’ complaints to their child’s school affecting their child, including those which concern bullying. The Department for Children, Schools and Families is asking for views on ways to improve the handling of complaints at school level, the place of mediation services to resolve disagreements early on and possible new arrangements to consider complaints that cannot be resolved at school level.
They wish to hear the views of as many people and organisations as possible, including parents, so why not take 5 minutes to make your views known?
Launch Date: 26th September 2008 Closing Date: 21st November 2008
Click here to take part (opens in new window).
Forthcoming meetings
Our most recent meeting was held on Wednesday 17th September in Exmouth. We were joined by Louise Edmonds who returned to update us on the success of the the East Devon Activity Scheme and by Ali Grew who was representing the Joint Agency Service and answering questions from parents.
Our next meeting has been arranged for
Wednesday 19th November
The meeting will be held at the Exmouth Leisure Centre and will run from 11.00am to 1.00 pm as usual.
At the meeting there will be a chance for you to raise any concerns or problems you may have. These meetings are also a great opportunity to meet other parents and share information. This meeting will focus on the topic of education, so please let me know if you would like to raise an issue for discussion.
Debbie Wheeler, the newly appointed Parent Partnership officer will be joining us to introduce herself and to talk about what support and training they can offer families.
View the agenda for the meeting here
We have also arranged to meet for lunch at the Bowd Inn, near Sidmouth on Wednesday 10th December. We will be there from 11.30am onwards, so please join us if you can. You are welcome to just turn up, but if you could let me know if you hope to come then we will have some idea as to how large a table we will need.
I am also organising some events in Exeter which you are very welcome to come to if you would like a break from your Christmas preparations.
A full list of pre-Christmas meetings can be seen here
All parents are very welcome to attend any of the meetings. Remember, you can claim for travel expenses to the meeting either by car or public transport. If you need additional childcare in order to attend this can also be reimbursed provided it is in a registered childcare setting. Please contact me for further details or just turn up on the day.
Notes from local meetings
The notes and information from our meetings can be found by clicking on the links below.
Events
Practical Strategies for Coping with Challenging Behaviour *UPDATE*
The conference held on 8th July was extremely well attended again. The day followed a similar format to the previous one with both speakers and smaller workshops.
The notes from the day can be viewed by clicking on the link below.
Challenging Behaviour Day - July 08
Notes from the May conference day are available below:
Challenging Behaviour Day - May 2008