Getting to know you

Our last update explained the background to the Tayside Children’s Collaborative. We want our collaborative to be truly that – a collaboration between colleagues, all able to contribute their passion and expertise on our journey to making Tayside the best place in Scotland to grow up.

With that in mind, we have developed a short online survey to give us a baseline of your views and help us to shape communications that meet your needs. Please take two minutes to fill it in. If you want to contribute further, there is an option to sign up for any future focus groups we may hold to get more detailed views on individual topics.

Regional Improvement Lead Sheena Devlin has also arranged dates to meet colleagues across the Tayside area, answer questions and hear feedback. These are:

• Arbroath: at the head teachers’ meeting on 22 February
• Perth: at the head teachers’ meeting on 30 January

Sessions in Dundee are currently being confirmed. If you are unable to attend but have a comment or question to contribute, please send it to [email protected]

Regional Improvement Leads

The Regional Improvement Leads for all of the Regional Improvement Collaboratives have now been announced:

• Forth Valley and West Lothian Collaborative: Robert Naylor, Director of Education, Falkirk Council
• The Northern Alliance: Gayle Gorman, Director of Children’s Services, Aberdeen City Council
• South East Collaborative: Carrie Lindsey, Executive Director, Fife Council
• South West Collaborative: Douglas Hutchison, Director of Education, South Ayrshire Council
• The Tayside Collaborative: Sheena Devlin, Director of Children’s Services, Perth & Kinross Council
• The West Partnership: Mhairi Shaw, Director of Education, East Renfrewshire Council

Work so far

Meetings and introductions have already taken place with key stakeholders across the partnership.

On 17 November, Sheena Devlin and Pauline Steven gave a presentation about the Tayside Children’s Collaborative to ADES, the Association for Directors of Education.

24 November saw the first meeting of the newly constituted Scottish Education Council, chaired by John Swinney MSP. The six regional leads are members of this group, along with colleagues from Education Scotland, the Care Inspectorate, SQA, professional associations and Scottish Government.

The first meeting of the Tayside Children’s Collaborative Leadership Forum took place on 6 December and was attended by a range of officers and practitioners from across our area. This group will be leading the actions in the plan we will submit to Scottish Government by the end of January 2018.

On 14 December, political leaders, convenors and chief executives met with Sheena to hear about the Collaborative. This was a positive meeting, with cross-party support for the approach we are taking.

Coming soon

Save the date 21 February, when a Scottish Attainment Challenge Pupil Equity Funding event will be held in Dundee for head teachers and education officers from across Tayside. Details of this will be confirmed soon.