Interesting Times!

Thursday 11 June 2009

I spent a couple of hours this morning with Children's Services Scrutiny Board talking about the year ahead and the challenges and opportunities we all face...

I was there with Cllr Stuart Golton, Cllr Richard Harker and Rosemary Archer, Director of Children's Services. It was again really useful to be able to use the planning for the session to run through the issues we are dealing with and how they connect with our Strategic Plan. My personal review ranged across the following, in no particular order:

Developing Apprenticeships and Diplomas as part of a coherent 14 - 19 offer;
Developing 'Every Child a Reader' and 'Every Child Counts';
Developing PSCE and SRE provision in schools;
Developing 'Sustainable Schools' in Leeds;
Developing the Early Years and Foundation Stage curriculum and it's transition to Key Stage 1;
Developing the Safer Schools programme working with West Yorkshire Police and other partners;
Developing volunteering as part of the National Year of Volunteering 2010;
Further developing a programme of cultural change based on equity, equality and social justice;
Further developing our 'Leeds Healthy Schools' programme;
Further developing the Academies programme here in Leeds;
Further developing 'The Power of Me' programme;
Further developing the schools workforce to implement and deliver new local strategies,
National Strategies programmes and DCSF policy developments;
Further developing the skills agenda and managing the Machinery of Government changes and the disappearance of the Learning and Skills Council;
Further developing Trusts, Federations and partnerships to drive locality approaches to improved outcomes, behavioural provision and 14 - 19 pathways;
Implementing the Government's approach to 21st Century Schools;
Implementing the Leeds Inclusive Learning Strategy;
Introducing the Government's new School Report Card;
Maintaining a relentless and uncompromising focus on outcomes for looked-after children, children on free school meals and other target groups;
Maintaining our focus on excellence, standards and outcomes for all our children and young people;
Managing and responding to the significant increase in the primary population in Leeds;
Managing the impact of budget changes;
Managing the implications of the Rose Review;
Reorganising the behavioural provision in Leeds;
Successfully delivering two more Academies in Leeds;
Tackling obesity through exercise and diet.

Not really a lot to do then!

I would welcome your feedback.. is there anything I have missed?

Chris

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Brilliant Quotes!

“I must accept life unconditionally. Most people ask for happiness on condition. Happiness can only be felt if you don't set any condition.”
Margaret Lee Runbeck

“Happiness is not in our circumstances but in ourselves. It is not something we see, like a rainbow, or feel, like the heat of a fire. Happiness is something we are.”
John B. Sheerin

“Most true happiness comes from one's inner life, from the disposition of the mind and soul. Admittedly, a good inner life is difficult to achieve, especially in these trying times. It takes reflection and contemplation and self-discipline.”
William L Shirer

“The pursuit of happiness is a most ridiculous phrase: If you pursue happiness you'll never find it.”
C.P. Snow

“Doubly rich is the man still boyish enough to play, laugh and sing as he carries and emanates sunshine along a friendly road.”
Charles R. Wiers

"Faith is not a shelter against difficulties, but belief in the face of all contradictions."
Paul Tournier

"Convictions are the mainsprings of action, the driving powers of life. What a man lives are his convictions."
Francis C. Kelley

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Sydney Smith

"It is often just as sacred to laugh as it is to pray"
Charles R. Swindoll

"Things never go so well that one should have no fear; and never so ill that one should have no hope"
Turkish proverb

"Teachers open the door, but you must enter by yourself"
Chinese proverb

"Don't bother to be better than your contemporaries or predecessors. Try to be better than yourself."
William Faulkner

"In times of change, learners will inherit the earth,while the learned will find themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists"
Eric Hoffer

"Life is what happens while you are busy making other plans."
John Lennon

"Few will have the greatness to bend history itself; but each of us can work to change a small portion of events, and in the total of all those acts will be written the history of this generation."
Robert F. Kennedy

"The difference between what we do and what we are capable of doing would suffice to solve most of the world's problems."
Mahatma Gandhi

"Determine that the thing can and shall be done, and then we shall find the way."
Abraham Lincoln

"The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy."
Martin Luther King Jr.

"There is nothing in life so difficult that it cannot be overcome. This faith can move mountains. It can change people. It can change the world."
Norman Vincent Peale

"Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the the universe."
Albert Einstein

"Life isn't measured by the number of breaths we take but the moments that take our breath away."
Anonymous

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John Quincy Adams

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Ralph Waldo Emerson