Hampshire County Council

SACRE Item 8

5 June 2007

Project on social cohesion in Hampshire

Report of the Director of Children's Services

1

Summary

1.1

This report provides a summary of the progress of the new project to address social cohesion in Hampshire. The purpose of the project is to construct a strategy for addressing social cohesion in relation to community diversity and conditions for effective learning of pupils in schools.

This project supports the following Hampshire County Council priorities:

1.2

"Making Hampshire safer and more secure for all" - by encouraging better and more informed relations between communities and institutions

"Maximising well-being" - by addressing common purpose amongst communities in Hampshire and its children

"Enhancing our quality of place" - through providing support for the positive recognition of minority communities and religious groups.

1.3

The decision supports the following Aims of the Children Act:

(Being healthy; Staying safe; Enjoying and achieving; Making a positive contribution; Economic well-being) by ensuring that social cohesion is addressed in Hampshire and its neighbouring communities to enhance the safety of environments, positive relations between different groups, achievement and enjoyment of children in schools and their larger learning, improving the prospect of economic well-being for minorities of different faiths.

2

Recommendations

a)

That:

SACRE endorses the plans made so far by the Social Cohesion Steering group.

3

Background

3.1

A Steering group has been established and as a result of its meetings a strategy is taking shape. Links have been made with the Rights Respect and Responsibilities initiative through the local authority's Inspector for Intercultural Education and with the University of Winchester .

3.2

Two secondary schools will initially be involved, one in the south and one in the north of the county plus a selected feeder in the primary phase to each school. The pilot in each area of the county will take a different approach.

3.3

South of the county pilot. These schools will be twinned with schools in Southampton with diverse ethnic/ religious and cultural intake. `Modules' are to be constructed on social cohesion for pupils involved. These will be enquiry based, constructed to the Living Difference cycle of learning model. Working with secondary and primary schools in Southampton has yet to be determined, but a similar model could be used. The object is to bring the pupils from these schools together in order to learn from each other and report back to their own school in order to initiate change in addressing social cohesion.

3.4

At the same time sessions to be undertaken with faith representatives from the `visits and visitors' list held at the RE Centre. These will be training sessions on engagement with pupils in classrooms or faith community institutions (such as places of worship) based on enquiry and engagement that promotes understanding of issues involved with social cohesion as well as religious identity. This will interact with the pupil modules in schools (for example pupils can inform faith representatives of how effective engagement and participation can occur and issues that need to be addressed from their perspective).

3.5

The university of Winchester would involve its student trainees in the pilot through making available an optional module and their participation would be across and within its various aspects.

3.6

North of the County pilot. This would focus on the issues that have emerged through Nepalese children being placed in these schools. It would involve the wider services in the county concerned with these. The secondary school chosen will be done through liaison with district local authority management, would be based on RR and R(Rights Respect and Responsibility) principles and will need to be agreed by the RRandR steering group to make funds available. The secondary school chosen would also, ideally, be one with high ethnic/ religious and cultural diversity.

LINK(S) TO CORPORATE STRATEGY

YES

NO

Hampshire safer and more secure for all

_

Maximising well-being

_

Enhancing our quality of place

_

This proposal does not link to the Corporate Strategy but, nevertheless, requires a decision because: