North Yorkshire County Council

North Yorkshire

Standing Advisory Council on Religious Education (SACRE)

October 2021

Update from the Local Authority

1.0	Purpose of the Report
	To inform Members on work carried out by Local Authority Officers in the support of SACRE.

2.0       Communication and resourcing    

2.1       Local Authority Officers have met with the Professional RE Adviser in order to co-ordinate training and the work plan.

2.2       The Local Authority Officers and Professional RE Adviser are continuing to work with the clerk to update and improve both the public facing and school facing website pages relating to SACRE, Religious Education and Collective Worship.  Further work to audit and update resources for schools will begin this term.

2.3      The termly newsletter is continuing to be distributed to schools via the Red Bag system, and occasional and ad hoc information is also posted via Red Bag.

3.0       Training         

3.2       The training programme continues to be offered. The 2022 offer will be finalised this term. Feedback from courses this year will be used to inform content for future courses. It is intended that courses will continue to be delivered remotely via MS Teams.

4.0       Support for Senior Leaders and Governors

4.1       The Professional RE Adviser will brief NYCC school advisers on the role of SACRE, the legal framework for RE and the locally agreed syllabus on 5^th November 2021.

4.2       The School Improvement Service Strategy has been revised with a significantly increased tariff of adviser support across all categories of school.

4.3       The School Improvement Service has a new set of priorities for this academic year. The overarching priority is ‘Know our schools’. RE is an aspect of 7 of the 8 priorities. LA colleagues will work with the Professional Adviser over the next year to ensure integration and understanding of the role of SACRE for School Improvement and successful Ofsted outcomes.

5.0       Monitoring of RE and the Agreed Syllabus

5.1       Local Authority records indicated that 227 community schools and 33 academy schools were given access to the NYCC Agreed Syllabus over the last academic year.

5.2       An electronic questionnaire was distributed to schools at the beginning of term. A reminder to request all schools to complete the questionnaire will be sent out this week.

6.0       Ofsted inspections

6.1       Since the last SACRE meeting there have been 3 published monitoring visits and 2 published inspections.

6.2       There is one reference to RE in an inspection report whose overall effectiveness was inadequate – “There are few opportunities for pupils to develop their spiritual knowledge and understanding. Pupils do not have a good knowledge of different faiths and cultures.”

7.0       New SACRE Annual Report Framework

7.1       Attached is information received from NASACRE relating to the new Annual Report Framework. 

7.2       NASACRE, in conjunction with the Department for Education, will be undertaking a national analysis of Annual Reports using this framework from September 2021.

7.3       Officers are working on the Annual Report, ensuring that it reflects the template from NASACRE. 

7.4       A draft of the Annual Report will be presented to SACRE for approval at its meeting on 7^th December 2021.

Adrian Clarke

Principal Education Adviser (Support)

Education and Skills Service

County Hall, Northallerton

October 2021

Report Author: Adrian Clarke

Background documents:  None