Helping West Berkshire Council to support young people effectively

By providing the full picture of what’s happening in the lives of young people, we’re helping West Berkshire Council to intervene in time and secure more positive outcomes for young people.

West Berkshire Council started using our Integrated Youth Support Services solution (IYSS) to record and track information on young people and to complement the other Capita solutions already in use in the local authority.

Alex Pye, 16-24 Tracking & Engagement Officer in the West Berkshire School Improvement Team, was impressed with the quick implementation of the system: “My focus was on making sure all the data we migrated ended up in the right place…and it worked! Getting started was pretty much seamless from the outset.”

The School Improvement Team completed their first statutory return with the IYSS software the following month and now use it for the CCIS return each month, the annual activity survey and the September Guarantee return. Alex has also valued the customer care they’ve received: “Whenever we’ve had a query we’ve received quick and timely support from the Capita team to ensure we’ve ready for the submission of returns.”

Sharing crucial data to ensure quick, effective support

Since then, the team has been making use of the solution to give them the full picture of what’s happening with a young person, including sharing key data with schools: “We have strong relationships with our schools who provide us with lists of offers for young people, which we can then support the young person to take up,” says Alex.

The flow of information from the schools means that Alex can step in quickly if something’s wrong: “I can view real-time school attendance data for a young person and can see from the patterns when it would be a good day to visit them in school if they’re showing problems with attainment, for example.”

Effective multi-agency working

Because the data is integrated with Capita education data held in other council departments, it also supports effective multi-team working, as Alex explains: “I’m drawing on data already held, removing the need to re-enter data and making it easy for me to see any past interactions, as well as any key people I may need to contact, such as the education welfare officer.

“Because I can update directly into the system, I can also share crucial information with other teams working with that young person. This ensures I can support other departments more effectively, such as the home education team, and that I’m not wasting the young person’s time - and mine - trying to get in touch if someone else in the council knows where they are.“

Dynamic reporting

Alex explains how the intuitive reporting and analysis tools ensure he has all he needs to provide the most effective support: “It’s easy to analyse information – one of the reports I do is to map free school meal information against destinations. I then send that report to the schools to help them ensure they’re spending pupil premium funds most effectively. I can also support the Healthy Child Programme by making sure that young people are flagged appropriately and that we’re delivering services where they’re needed most.”

Alex finds access to data key for being able to intervene sooner and to greater effect: “Before we used IYSS, we would receive a termly list from schools of young people attending – this could sometimes be three months after that young person’s attendance had dropped, giving time for negative learning behaviours to be established as they fall out of the routine of, say, getting up and ready each morning. Now, because we’re aware much sooner who’s not attending, we can respond more quickly – it’s really helping in terms of moving those clients forward.”

“For example, if a young person stops attending sixth form, then I know within a week and we can follow that up by offering the right level of support and careers guidance to help them onto the next step – whether that’s continuing with sixth form or considering a different course. I also know if a young person has been excluded from school and, because I have the full picture of their individual circumstances, can quickly assess exactly what support they need at that time.”

Securing positive outcomes

Alex summarises the benefits of using Capita’s IYSS solution: “I like the fact it’s integrated with the information we already hold in our Capita education database. All that information is so rich in providing a clear, up to date picture of exactly what’s going on with that young person, enabling us to intervene in time to make a difference and secure more positive outcomes as a result.”