 Fygo bo wrth iawn, ac yn dweud yn y 6 fawr ar esgweddraeth o'i siwgrws i'r cwestiynau yn 22 yma. Fodd ir gwaith oddi, James Dornan. felly hefyd yn ddifudod datblygu na'i ddaw' i Natalie Don, MSP, rwyf ddim i'n gweithio'r amser o'r morhau i amser开始. Rydyn ni'n gwybodaethu Natalie. E'n gweithio'n gweithio Natalie ford, ac mae'n gweithio i ddim ni'n gweithio'r ystyried am effeithglassion i'r Cymru. Felly, dwi'n credu i ddechrau'r echadwch uchglig o'r gyfnodol. Mae gyrai'r cymdeinlog yn ddechrau, a ddim yn iawn o'u darpen o'i tynnu yng ngorfforddolei. Felly, gyrraedd wrth gwrs, rydw i ni'n meddwl i chi'n cael ei gweld oedd, mae'n gweld i chi i ei geisinau i gwyllud o casgfa ar y cyfnodol, ac yn gwrsbryd gan… arredumpion o publygu panellangor ond yn y Yazd, a'r ystafell ar gyfer FWC, ond oedd yn gwybod i'r cerddol. Fynddon ni'n fydd ystafell ar gyfer mae'n gweithio pethau a'r sefydliadau i'r спheiriau iawn yn ei ddwyledig a'r eich ynrhywb ni oedd ddwyledig yn eisiau o dyfodol. Mae'n bynnag o'r cadw, sy'n ei gweithio i chi i fynd yn y cymaint a newydd honno, oherwydd gan y newid ei gweithio sy'n portodd o bwc, lle mae'n ddwyledig pa ridei gofnod pleidwyr yn gwneud o'r cymdeilfyniadau i'r unrhyw gwahau i'w rai gwybod neu dechrau o'r ffyddiau i'r chwarae apemフyrddau mai gweld llawer i sut hwnnw i'r lleidaeth, a Adon Sjoe-Mannusau. A fwy roi'r Cymru yna o'r parwysau, pan rydym yn ysgrif iawn i'r clywed yr unrhyw yn 50 mwy o'r ddigon ddedechrau i'r Gymru, ac yn iawn i'r erfyniaid o'r parwysau i'r gydy crocodile i ddiogeddwyd yn gyforderu'r bwysig iawn. Fydd ystafell ar gweithio'r cysyllt provide ar gyfer mae'n i ddod, ac yn mynd rwy'n gwybod ysbyt cyfred이'r bwysig iawn. Ond e'n fwmpio i gydag ymdysgwrs sydd wedi cymryd y cysylltu'r bwysig iawn ywerthio'r bwysig iawn i ddod, ac i gydig o'r bwysig iawn i ddod, maen nhw ddatblygu'r lleidiau erÙl i gyrfaith cyf evidenciaidd aethwrd aethwrdd yn cyfroddiadau. I think it's important that the public know we are alive to these issues and that, as a committee, we're taking our job of scrutiny seriously. Ideally, I would therefore like to see a decision taken to move our work programme discussion today into public session to allow this urgent matter to be addressed. However, if that's not possible, I would like to seek your assurance that this matter can be put on the public agenda for next week. Right, well let me consider what you have said. Bob indicated that he wanted to say something and I think that it's only fair that I allow him the same privilege that I've allowed. Just very briefly could be that it is, of course, for Mr Mundell to whatever points he seeks to make at this committee. I'm conscious when this committee started in this session where he said, we work collegiately, we work cross-party and we challenge the government as and when appropriate in the strongest possible fashion when we had to but we seek to work constructively with government and constructively across this committee. I'm therefore disappointed we get a set piece statement from Mr Mundell which I would consider grandstanding. There's been lots of opportunities to raise these concerns within committee before. Now including this morning indeed where you yourself, convener in private session said, does anyone else want to make us aware of anything that they might wish to raise at today's meeting? No member afforded themselves that opportunity at that time. So I'm keen to work collegiately as a committee to decide how best to respond to Mr Mundell's comments, but the idea of ambushing a committee at the start of a meeting when he has lots of other opportunities to put this to fellow committee members and work collegiately, I find very disappointing, I find a tone unhelpful, I find it overtly party politicised and it's not the way I want this committee to work. Well Bob, I can perfectly understand the sentiment behind your words, but I've now, Willie Rennie has indicated your seat. To be fair, having allowed two colleagues, I don't think I can know it. I think that Oliver Mundell has got a point. There has been deep frustration that the Government hasn't been as open as I think it should be over the OECD process and I think it's important that it's highlighted that this committee takes a direct interest that we have a public session on it, that we seek evidence from the Government, we seek an appeal to them to give us the more information that we've been asking for for months and I think it would be wrong if the media scrutiny on this wasn't replicated with scrutiny by this committee because I think we've got a massive responsibility. So I would like to see a public session however this has been brought up and I think it's important that we actually do take a role seriously and actually do scrutinise the Government and seek the openness that I think teachers and pupils deserve. So I would like to see a session on this at a future committee meeting. Thank you Willie Ross. Thanks, convener. Again briefly, I mean, if the reports of the SQA attempting to limit the damage to their reputation in the OECD report are true, they obviously didn't do a very good job of it because the Scottish Government has decided to abolish and replace the SQA. On the question of how we take this forward as a committee, I agree absolutely that there's a need for substantial public parliamentary scrutiny of this process. I would prefer that we discuss how we are going to do that as a committee in the normal way through our normal work planning procedures. If we decide at our work planning discussion after the public session of this meeting that we're going to move forward with public sessions, then we will do so and they will be on the record, but I don't like the implication that the way parliamentary committees go about their normal work planning, i.e. in private, so that we can flush out the issues collectively and decide how we're going to go about it publicly. I don't like the implication that that is somehow a behind closed doors process that lacks scrutiny in and of itself. That is the normal way that Parliament functions. I'm quite sure that, as a result of our private session today on our work planning meeting, we will make decisions about what we're going to do in public about this, as we would have done regardless of what's just happened this morning. Thanks, convener. I've got a lot of something with all the contributions so far, I have to say. In terms of what Mr Mundell says, the core of it, I do think that the early drafts of this pre-amendment should be published. It should absolutely be in the public domain and we should see them and we should be able to have a look at that. The other comments in terms of how we work as a committee, I also agree with those that we want to do that collegiately and work together, but I think that we need to find a way to tell Government that we want to see those publications and see them quickly and that we want to be able to understand the process of amendment and the influence that is brought to bear on them. So, if we may come to a resolution on this, how we do that I think is the question, but I think that it wants to be pretty clear that we should see that publication as soon as possible. Right. Well, you know, this is not an agenda item that we're following today and Bob Doris made the point that I did ask in the pre-meeting if there was anything people wanted to raise about the meeting and there was no mention in that meeting of this item. So, I think that my response to all of this is that we should consider this further when we meet in private later this morning. We should have a discussion about that or consider it further, but everyone has a fair chance to make their views known. I think that that is my role here as a convener, but having said that, I do think that we should consider this further in the private session that we fought for this morning and we should move on to our agenda item as planned and I hope that you will all agree with that. The item that I think we should move on to is the main item for which we are delighted to welcome guests into Parliament physically in our committee room. That is to take evidence as part of our Scottish attainment challenge inquiry. Our focus this week is on the work of the third sector organisations that provide services funded through the attainment challenge. As I said, I'd like to welcome a witness this morning. We have Jim Wallace, director of children and families at Aberlour child care trust, and Jim is joining us remotely. Morine Macathear, assistant director of Barnardo Scotland, who is with us in the committee room. Sarah, is it Sarah or Sarah? I should have asked that, shouldn't I, earlier? Sarah? Sarah, I apologise. Sarah Spencer, cost of the school day project manager of the child poverty action group in Scotland, who is remote, and Louise Goodlard, who is senior head of partnership with Scotland, the Princess Trust Scotland. You are all very welcome. To get us under way this morning, given the fact that we are considering the work of the third sector in relation to the Scottish attainment challenge, perhaps I can start perhaps with Morine. Morine, why is the work that Barnardo's does in relation to the attainment challenge? Why? Is this additive? Is it additional to what was going on before? What is the value of the third sector involvement in this from your point of view? Alongside a lot of other third sector organisations, we have always worked in partnerships with families and communities in schools. From a Barnardo's perspective, we have definitely been able to extend our involvement with schools through the Scottish attainment challenge. To give you a bit of an idea of scale, we work in 400 schools across Scotland, and probably about a third of that is funded through the Scottish attainment challenge. That work tends to take a range of different forms. It can be one-to-one support for children in school. It can be group work with children in school. We do a lot of family support, so strengthening that link between the home, the family and the community. A lot of work around removing barriers is said for children's participation in their education. There is a lot of work around reducing anxiety, improving self-esteem, improving engagement in their learning and thinking about families and what particularly might be getting in the way of a child, optimising their engagement in school. A lot of that relates to child poverty. What do you bring that was not already there? Presumably, if you were not there, the role that you are playing would be played by someone else in the public sector. The additionality does not necessarily need to be a third sector provider that does that, but it often is. The role that we have in the work that we do is very much focused on the child, the family and the community. It is about a recognition that some of the challenges that barriers to learning are not within the class environment or the school environment. A lot of the barriers are to do with what is going on in a child's life outside of school. You all know that children spend 80 per cent of their time outwith school, so what happens in their family and community can have a huge influence on their capacity to engage in the learning opportunities that they have. I think that he's got a line of questioning that will go down this line of zone and I can chip in. Thank you. I'll maybe start off with Maureen, but this is a question for everyone on the panel. I say this with no pre-judgment, but I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on why the third sector is providing something that councils either won't or can't. What's the unique contribution that justifies quite a significant amount of money being given to third sector organisations to deliver this, as opposed to being delivered through councils themselves, regional improvement collaboratives, if it's about scale, etc? Why the third sector, rather than the public sector, I suppose, is what I'm asking? I think that the third sector brings a unique set of skills. Our focus is specifically on wellbeing and its widest sense, so we are able to think about the child not just within the class environment, as our education colleagues tend to do, and thinking about how those links that I've mentioned earlier between the family and the community, and our staff are trained in relational practice, they're trained in trauma-informed approaches, they can think about how to support a child to maybe find it difficult in the school environment and bring a sort of different lens to what might work in an educational environment or provide stepping stones for a child to reintegrate if fully into their learning environment. Thanks. Any of our other panels like to come in on that wider question of why the third sector is providing something that the public sector can't or won't, and maybe I will ask Folker joining us remotely. First Jim, do you have any thoughts on that? Yeah, I think that a big strength of the third sector is the ability to engage with families, and we've built up an understanding of the kind of challenges that are happening in the home as well as in the school. I mean it's not to say that statutory providers can't do these things, but certainly the work that we've done and I think the work of Barnardo's committee members have checked with schools, headteachers find it useful to have this additional support and to have people in with a different focus on the family issues. Schools are under lots of pressure, they've got lots of children to work with and I think it's useful to have additional people coming in and providing support and it can really provide some kind of transformational outcomes for children. We're particularly good at listening to children and families and understanding the needs that they have and the challenges that they can face. And you know, as Moring was saying, what impacts on children's learning, there are multiple issues and it's complex I think to be addressed within the school thing, the school situation. I mean in our submission we did some work and looked at particular children where there were kind of key, identified key obstacles to their learning and I think that we can actually help schools to work with those different multiple obstacles that are barriers to children's learning in school. You said there, Jim, that it's not that statutory providers can't give the kind of comprehensive holistic family support that you provide. The implication there perhaps is that they won't or there's some other barrier. Are you able to expand on that? Why do you think it's possible for a statutory provider to do what you're doing but that that's not happening at the moment? I think they just have vast pressures in terms of their resources and their demand upon their services and I think it's about the partnership with the third sector. It just adds additional resource to that and you know in some situations families and children have, you know, I think the third sector can help build bridges back to better engagement with statutory services and that's one of the things we've noted through our family work. Sometimes people can feel kind of disengaged and mistrustful of what support's offered. Sometimes parents that we work with have had their own negative experiences of school and that impacts on their attitudes and that's reflected through their children so, you know, we can work with parents and, you know, try and help them kind of view school and statutory services differently and create kind of a better footing for kind of working together. Thanks, Sarah. Would you like to come in on this question? Sure. Speaking about cost of the school day specifically, we work with schools and local authorities around financial barriers at school for children and young people in their families and also sort of looking at practical ways to overcome those and remove the barriers, usually focusing around reducing costs for families, costs for participation and also focusing on incomes. So, I think in terms of thinking where that fits within the Scottish attainment challenge, it's about removing barriers, it's about reducing costs, it's about creating the conditions for attainment and sort of the foundations that other interventions are going to stand on. So, thinking of kind of why the third sector, why not anyone else, I think that in terms of what cost of the school day is working on, in terms of awareness and action around poverty, there are lots of different people working in that area, lots of really brilliant work in local areas from equity teams, there's the work of the attainment advisers and just a whole range of people working to do these things. I think that the additional value of having third sector organisations is that they can bring, I think of ourselves, for example, I think we would bring evidence to this from wider work of the organisation, wider research into child poverty, wider expertise on, for example, the impact of social security changes in recent years and how that impacts on families, so there's a kind of extra element there. Importantly, what we try to do is take evidence from the schools that we work with and the children and the families that we work with and use that to try to inform policy, so I think there's something there. I think it's something that all of the different actors working in this area find useful that additionality there. I think that, similar to what has been said, some of it is about the expertise that the third sector can bring. From the Princess Trust perspective, the work that we do is in schools and it is about working with those young people that are maybe schools not really working for them, they're struggling and we set up almost like a separate club that's about practical skills and a lot of employability skills, so really helping them move towards a kind of positive destination once they leave school. Within that, we help them with attainment through Princess Trust qualifications that are about personal and social development and employment skills that they can gain. As part of that, we bring a lot of employers and our employer network with us, which is something that certainly schools can kind of struggle to do and obviously there's other areas of Scottish Government policy, like developing young workforce that are focused on that, but certainly someone like the Princess Trust, we can bring big national employers into schools and to support our work. We've also got the expertise that sits behind a lot of the lesson plans and the way that we structure that programme. We bring a lot of that youth work skill and I think it's important that we find working with young people, often statutory services can be off-putting to them for whatever reason and they find a brand like the Trust is, you know, it's a trusted brand, they know it's for young people so it can, you know, because a lot of this is, as Sarah said, is about those underlying foundations that help attainment, so it's that kind of confidence, it's motivation, it's engagement and I guess I would also kind of question when you said about, you know, there's an awful lot of money going out of the attainment challenge to the third sector. One of the reasons I was keen to be here today is because I think it's interesting there's a perception that we benefit a lot from the attainment challenge and actually we are funded by local authorities but as far as I'm aware, none of them have named that as attainment challenge funding. I think, you know, I couldn't swear to it that it's not because they don't just, you know, I don't always know exactly what pot there that's coming out of to support the Trust but certainly we haven't seen a huge increase in funding to the work we're doing as a result of the challenge and well maybe, you know, we don't want to plead on about funding and you know, there are lots of value to the attainment challenge but I just, I suppose if there's a perception that there is a lot of money coming to the third sector from my perspective, I don't kind of see that really so. Thanks, that's really interesting but I'm aware that that leads directly into lines of questioning that other members have indicated they'd like to come in on so I'll leave it there and give them the opportunity to do that and if there's time later I'll come back particularly to Jim on some of Aberlore's specific services. Let's talk about just, Louise, just expand a bit on the way that the Princess Trust interacts with local authorities so how does it work? Just talk us through what a relationship with a local authority looks like. Is it with a school or with a local authority? If it's to the local authorities is it with a group of schools within the local authority or is it with individual schools that positively engage with you? How does it work? Different in different places, I would say it's quite a patchwork. We have some great local authority relationships where we work very closely with the authority and they will direct us to which schools they would like us to work with or which schools are really keen to have an achieve club as we call it, which is our Princess Trust offer. In other areas we might have the local authority might say, we wouldn't engage with you but we can almost broker on your behalf with the schools so that might be saying to us can we talk to individual schools in regards to PEF funding or something like that. In other areas schools will come directly to us and they will have heard of our product and they will be like, we really want to have this in our schools. I suppose another great boon of the third sector is we can bring investment from outside the public sector as well so the trust has a mix of funders but it does, as a result of that, I guess it's messy. There's different sources of funding and ultimately for us it's about can we be there for as many young people as we can that need our support. The majority of times it is a relationship with a local authority who will part fund our work and also help us with those relationships with schools but then once we have that in place we work with the school directly and we actually go out and train, it's a member of the school itself that will run the programme. Yes, it's a member of staff, often pastoral care staff or someone who's really passionate about what we do in employability and we train them, they go out and run the course but then we're there, they have a contact for support and so that's why it's so scalable. So what is it? Did you call it an achievement club? Yes, so we have achieved clubs. So it's a small group of young people that have been identified by the school that could really benefit from this kind of support, they take it as one of their, usually they would take it as one of their lesson options from S3, S4 and they would and it's very project based so they'll work towards a kind of formal qualification, a Princess Trust qualification but there's a kind of different strands of I suppose a kind of curriculum around it so they can do preparation for work, health and wellbeing. Do the participants self-select or are they selected? Did you indicate? It's a mix I would say, usually you know think people like their careers advisor from SDS might recommend to them if there's an achieved club in the school that might be something you consider, I think it tends to be their guidance teacher as they're picking their subjects will kind of recommend them, you know direct them that this might be something they would benefit from. It tends to be young people that may be at risk of leaving with no or very few qualifications so this is a really great way for them to kind of broaden their qualifications and what we hear time and again from young people is I just school, I was hating school, school wasn't doing anything for me. What the achieved club has done is I've got something on my CV to show I feel like I've got something to offer employers now. How do you measure the success of this then? Can you share any measurements of success with us this morning? Yeah sure so I mean we work with I think it's about 1700 young people and In all 32 local authority areas? It wouldn't be right across all 32, it would be more concentrated than that. I'd have to give you an example. Okay you can come back just on that. Of that around about pre Covid about 70% of them would be achieving a qualification. I would say during Covid that's kind of dropped maybe to about 50% understandably you know schools have had a lot of other things to think about so but the other I mean the way we measure it is we do kind of distance travelled measurements so we have like a my journey form which is about you know a young person tracking how their confidence is growing how their you know other soft skills because that's what we think is really important as you know to underpin that attainment but also we look at things like school leaver destinations how do they compare to the you know to the average for the young people that have been part of one of our clubs. So there's various different ways and we'll also gather kind of teacher feedback feedback from young people and so there's different routes that we kind of monitor and the success of the programme and it's actually something that we're in the middle of reviewing at the moment with the programme is how can we have even more impact evaluation behind it you know to get that that kind of measurement. Israble outcomes that you can share with the committee in relation to the the the population of of pupils that you engage with. Yeah yeah we've got data on that. And it's about positive outcomes so is that going on to apprenticeships college is that kind of outcomes we're talking about? Yeah absolutely so going on to something after school whether it's further education or into employment or into training of some sort. And is it basically your case that for every pound of resource that comes to an organisation like yours you bring more than that pound because you say you've got other resources that you call upon and you basically deliver that additionality that there's something different that you're bringing that wouldn't be there if you weren't there? Yeah I think so I mean the you know for example Apple are one of our partners so we with schools in Glasgow they because all the young people have their iPads now they we deliver digital skills that are designed by Apple you know they're learning kind of coding and so they're getting access to that kind of you know international recognised kind of training and that's because we're able to leverage in the investment but also that kind of focus is for Scotland's young people from an organisation like that that I don't think schools would just have the capacity to do so I think we're able to leverage in funding but also just really important kind of getting employers into schools as well and that really important there's a brilliant stat that Resolution Foundation have of you know it's something like if young people have four meaningful engagements with employers during their school time they're like 85% less likely to not have a destination when they come out of school so it's that thing of we can we can bring employers in we can with people like Tesco that help us to design our some of our programme so I think we bring a lot of value in the content that we can bring but also in the in you know financially as well but it is my concern is that that I hear what you're saying and I can think of examples in my constituency where that kind of interaction is going on between schools organisations like yourselves and employers and all kinds of external bodies that are there supporting young people which is fantastic but I also have many other examples of schools where none of that is happening and where local employers have even told me that they don't feel welcome at all I'm talking about pre-pandemic by the way I'm not just talking about during the pandemic and they don't feel as invited or you know as perhaps they ought to be is that your experience as well or I know we're talking in generalities here but is this a reflection of what the situation is across Scotland from your perspective rather than just central Scotland where I'm an MSP? I think it's hard to speak for schools where we're not in if that makes sense because you know that's not I suppose my experience I mean the ones you're not in as opposed to the ones that you're in as in you'll know what the balance looks like yeah and I think you know we do find there'll be local authorities we talk to and they will know which schools will welcome in the third sector and there'll be certain schools that will have everything you know and they'll be great and there'll be a real holistic support around young people and they might have Maureen's team helping at home and they might have the princess trust helping in school yeah but there'll be other schools where you know maybe the leadership in that school just don't see the value in that and I think you know it's and I know there's this real kind of balance at the moment between devolution of decision-making down to school level and I completely understand the power of that I suppose it's that consistency and equity piece that I'm like I you know obviously I'm going to say I think every school could benefit from from what we have to offer I think there will be young people in that school that could benefit but in a way in a way the barrier I suppose is the funding because we cannot we cannot make that offer to every single school without because we're a charity so you know and so we end up having to direct what we do not you know as much as possible we want to direct it to the young people that are trying to be supported in the attainment challenge young people from disadvantaged backgrounds but in a way we have to move as well with where we can pay for what we do and where we can yeah where we can resource it and then where the schools welcome us in and the value of what you deliver which is you know about the outcomes um michael mara thanks community I have to say I thought that the contribution of the princess trust here Louise Goodlide around the transparency of money was was a key one that we could come back to in terms of being able to follow if the organisation doesn't understand where the money is coming from I have to tell you it's quite difficult for us to tell at times where the money is coming to follow that and I see nodding heads from from other colleagues as well that that would be a very positive thing and my question actually follows on around that idea of additionality that the third sector brings and I've had representations from providers in the third sector talking about the amount of resource that they bring to the table on top of the commissioned work um I wonder Maureen McTea of Bernardo's if you could maybe say a little bit about um have you done any research or work in terms of the value percentage value that you bring on top of the commissioned work that you do it's very difficult to do that because it's very variable because it sort of depends what your core services to start with so often it's actually easier to leave it in more money the bigger your core services so for example if you are commissioned by one individual school to do to do a piece of work around support to families it's very difficult to bring lots of additionality to that however where you're commissioned across a whole local authority area it's a lot easier to bring in lots of additionality and really ramp up the offer because you've got that sort of stable core and I think that's a real flaw with PEF from our perspective the insecurity that it brings I mean most PEF contracts for the third sector are allocated annually we really welcome the fact that there's been a commitment this parliamentary term to clarify with the head teachers what they'll be getting over the course of the Parliament but I'm not entirely sure whether that will translate through to more stable contracts for the partners who are in those schools who are currently commissioned and I think there's also just to sort of pick up on some of the points that Louise made I think for us you know the innovation and you know having things decisions made very close to communities bring lots of benefits but there's a real from our perspective role for the local authority we've got direct comparisons where we have attainment challenge funding that's allocated across a local authority versus sort of individual schools across other authority areas and I think there's so many that strategic piece that happens when there's when it's all connected to the local children services planning partnership and you're thinking about the totality of resource right across all the different services that work together to support children and young people I feel that that you can really make a much bigger difference than the sort of granular work that you can do in a school or a PEF contract and there's so much additionality that can be brought to that and I think for me there is I'm interested in the interface between the work of attainment and the attainment challenge fund with other funding streams that come from Scottish Government because from our perspective the fragmentation of that can be quite challenging because from a family's perspective their needs are not chunked up into that's an attainment issue that's a family support issue that's an early years issue these things are all connected so I think that's why we feel a more holistic approach rather than a school centric approach is really essential here in terms of getting good outcomes for children young people and families thank you can I put a variation on the same question to Jim Wallace from Aberlour that kind of same question Jim around the additional resource that your organisation might bring I mean it's been reported to me in my home city of Dundee that those figures from a third sector organization could be up to 50 or 60 percent on a contract in terms of those centrally held and I think that Ms McTear makes the representation of that on a larger contract that's easier I understand that but do you feel that Aberlour brings that additional benefit yeah I think we bring lots of additionality and it all it isn't always just pounds though or kind of financial contributions you know since the start of the pandemic Aberlour is dispensed over two million pounds to families is we recognise that the biggest challenge facing many of our families in Scotland is poverty at the moment children can't learn if they're going to school hungry in the morning and you know they you know they can't settle at night in their house if they're too tired one of our workers was telling me the other week she was asked to go in and help children with their bedtime routines because they weren't settling and she said I taken cereal and biscuits and milk you know because the real reason they're not settling at night is they're actually hungry and if they're hungry in the morning when they go to school they're not in any ready state to learn so you know they're kind of getting kind of finance out to families directly to help them with the challenge and this is going to be a growing problem we've got the cost of living crisis coming upon us soon with you know storing kind of energy bills and things so we bring you know a lot of that kind of direct support to family which impacts on the services we support in schools positively as well and we're trying to influence when we have teams of people that are actually engaging with children and families to get their voices heard and their views because this is the real opportunity if we listen to families about what their challenges are and what they're facing what the stresses are the impact on them and then on their children we can deliver more so I think our contribution is in multiple kind of arenas around the whole issue of children's learning I've been in social work for 40 years and a lot of the issues that we're facing today have been around all through this time where some you know we used to speak the language the promise has helped us look at language differently as well because we used to speak about disengaged pupils and disaffected learners that was very common parlance which puts the problem squarely on the pupil the child you know and I think it's for us now to kind of turn that round and kind of look at differently what are the real barriers and take responsibility for helping creating the conditions where children learn and often it's about helping them building relationships helping them regulate their emotions and be ready to learn thanks Jim myself and a couple other members of the committee were privileged to visit some of your workers earlier in the weekend in Dundee and we heard about some of the work they do and I think it's really useful you talk about 30 years experience in terms of social work because my understanding of some of that conversation was this kind of work used to be done by social workers is that fair to some extent I think you know the kind of pressures on kind of local authorities and social work you know have demands gone up really and kind of resources have gone down so I think there's you know I would be I'd be slower to criticise but I think there were things that you know there was different engagements that social work was able to have with families 30 years ago than now so you know there's a need to try and kind of build build back and build the connection between between families and those supporting them and not judge people you know be on the sides not on their backs I think is the important thing I hear that loud and clear on you and I was I was I was hugely impressed by the workers that we met earlier in the weekend you know all credit to your organization for that work they're doing and my the tone of my question and that is not a criticism is we're trying to understand the money and what has replaced versus you know is there genuine additionality in terms of his new activity happening or of what we're seeing is money that has been in the public sector now been performing a role elsewhere I'm not casting aspersions on any of how it might be performed at the moment which is just important I think we understand whether more is being done or are we seeing it just done in a different way I suppose is that is that side of it can I have a final one if that's okay conveyor it's about that precarious the precarity of the funding so it there's in the written submission there's some some comment on this I know that it's a core issue for local authorities as well and for for headteachers how you sustain engagement of a long period of time is the threat to this you know we've had a guarantee from the scots government around you know this year a reduced amount of money but across coming years for this type of activity to the end of the parliament but the challenge with that is it not that it's set against the local government budget in terms of if the kind of interventions that we're talking about are taken out and that money is used to plug gaps is that part of that I took from the written submission I think from Bernardo's in particular that that was a challenge we had to see in the context of local government budgets would that be fair sorry if I can bring in morning market here and I'll come to you second if that's okay thank you yeah I think that is fair just prior to the pandemic we had published a report called challenges from the front line revisited which really sort of articulated the impact of austerity on services that are provided with by the third sector in this case Bernardo's but the interface with local authorities and just to reflect you know agree with what Jim was saying over time the sort of social work role shifting and changing and being far more focused on the children who are in need of caring protection and the third sector taking more of a role around that early intervention although some of us have been around a long time these are long-standard organisations with a you know a long history of supporting families and communities but I think just to also mention in relation to what we do that's different I think there has been a difference I can give you an example from one of our services where we had a previously a services broadly similar to what we do now that was funded by a grant but it was based in our service versus more or less the same service but with the outreach element and that connectivity with the school communities and the difference has been that there's far greater self-referos there's a far lower stigma access in the support there's a much lower rate of re-referos so when families get the support they need it seems to be working much more effectively and a big part of that I think is that those workers and that those supports are visible around school communities you can go in and get a wee drop in a wee chat somebody can give you a wee bit of light touch support a wee bit of signposting and you're averting a crisis whereas before it felt like it was harder to reach in and get the support that you needed so I do think that there is a benefit to that interface between community supports and the work that we do not just Barnardo's but connect and fill a third sector providers across local areas to make sure people are connected with the supports that they need and the sort of having that access via schools because people are in and out of schools it's a service it's a universal service so we can reach lots and lots and lots of families that way there's also Jim coming to you there's now a there's now a reliance on this work for what you're both describing I think in terms of if if that is not there then the social work services that would intervene no longer exist isn't that correct? Well I think there's been cuts to to service delivery so I think what the voluntary sector the third sector are providing now is fairly essential in order to keep you know pushing forward for good outcomes I think there's a question about how we evaluate the impact of of PEF and the the attainment monies and things and I think you know we need to establish clear measures of success so you know we could talk about the work we're doing in Dundee in one primary school we've worked with 60 percent of the children there's good feedback on on what we're doing there but how does that affect does that actually help overall to narrow the attainment gap I'm just not so sure about that I think we need to get real strong measures I think these bits of work are important but I think we need kind of more fundamental changes and strong commitments towards children's learning going forward and you know that one of the biggest things as I've said is poverty you know if we can't address that with quarter of a million children living in poverty that will obviously impact on school and their ability to to learn. Thanks computer. Maureen, when you were describing the support that you give families then you were talking very optimistically about some of the successes you've had can you just describe in practical terms what that support is to parents and to families yeah so when we work in schools we usually have a conversation with the head teacher about what's needed and what's required so I think that's the thing it's about as Louise was saying it's about trying to have some sort of consistency but also flex to individual context about what's required so some of that can be one to one support for children it can be group work we do social and emotional learning and also that family support I think as Jim's highlighted poverty is an enormous issue for families so a big part of our work would be about the material needs of a family and trying to put any mitigations we can in place in terms of child poverty but I don't think you can underestimate the psychological impact of just how hard it is living in poverty and the impact that has on people's sense of wellbeing navigating really complex systems to just survive and just depleting people so there's a lot of support around mental health and wellbeing so I think those two things interlink massively and you know the sorts of successes we see are you know it's interesting because I think we put it in a written submission like Jim saying it's very difficult for us to draw a direct line between what we do and an improvement in people's educational attainment but what we hopefully can do is you know kids maintaining their time in school enjoying school participating managing peer groups much better less you know not a queue of kids at the head teachers door every day because everybody seems to be managing a bit better all sorts of things around family you know families one of our outcomes is always around family wellbeing and the family themselves has identified they're getting on better they're getting the support they need they feel more in control they've got more efficacy they feel they've had their voices heard so all of those sorts of outcomes are the things that we would look for when we're working with families it's hard to measure because it's about people having confidence about meeting their own challenges and you know and within their own resources as well that's quite hard to measure isn't it? It is and it's often it's a long journey I think the temptation here to look for quick fixes and I think you know it's a bit in terms of the sort of backdrop the context families are living in and you know and we're in rising child poverty we're you know the cost of living crisis is that we're looking at is horrendous and the report we done prior to the pandemic really highlighted a pretty grim picture and it's only got worse yeah so I think that you know there is just so much support that needs to be put in place just for people to keep families stable because it is such a challenge and environment for them to be trying to connect and with schools and give their children the best possible chances in your written submission what struck me one particular thing struck me actually emotionally as well as in another respect was the bit where you talk about and one head teacher told us this is about people you know pupils engaging sustaining friendships margin transitions arriving on time feeling ready to learn and when you had this quote one head teacher told us if someone said to me but he's still not meeting his benchmarks I'd say but he's in class and that you know that's the kind of measurable thing that perhaps isn't going to hit any headlines but it's going to make a tangible difference in the longer term if kids aren't there they're not going to be learning and I think that you know there's so much more to this and I you know in terms of what is measured we've again in our submission mentioned the importance of health and wellbeing and I have to say over the pandemic I can feel a real we've always kind of lobbied and said there should be more focus on that and it has felt like it's been waited towards the academic attainment but then prior to coming here today I'd actually asked some of our head teachers to give me some feedback and every single one of them said that health and wellbeing is the foundation you will get nowhere if the health and wellbeing of the kids in your establishment is not secure if they don't feel safe if they don't feel nurtured you're on a hiding to nothing it doesn't matter how high quality your teaching and learning is if those kids are dysregulated they are not going to be able to make the most of the opportunities that you're giving them it's very helpful and we'll come back to some of those issues I want to bring in Fergus because sometime ago Fergus indicated he wanted to come in on the funding issue and it was a point that Michael had raised so Fergus would you like to come in and make that point now and get responses from the panel yes thank you convener and thank you to the witnesses for the evidence and really for what they do over the years convener I have had occasion to to work with some of the charities that are giving evidence today and I recognised what Mr Wallace said earlier that really what they do is in many ways not instead of but complementary additional to supplementary to what the state does through its agencies and it does so in a different way very often and not necessarily all about money so I just wanted to make that point that I don't think we should start off from the premise that if we had a perfect social work department and perfect state perfect schools we wouldn't need third sector I think third sector actually we do need in addition and I think it's easy to get sidetracked by regarding money as the proxy for everything because it's not but what I did want to ask convener was this that over the years I've been struck that many charities even leading charities such as Aberlauwer Bernadows and the Princes Trust all of whom have various funding streams as I understand it from the state and from private sector from philanthropic donation all of which is important however each has certain funding from the state and the impression I get convener is that many charities spend as much time chasing the money which is granted on a very short term basis from year to year as they do in performing the function which is to provide support in this case to the most needy so I've often thought that if the funding were to be guaranteed on a three yearly basis or a four yearly basis that would alleviate the pressures on major charities and really all charities quite considerably of course somebody lose funding altogether and that I'm afraid is is just something that will happen in life but I do wonder my question is this I'm sorry to be a wee bit long winded but you know have I analyzed this in a fair way and do the charities since we have them here spend a lot a lot of time chasing the funding rather than providing the services for which they get up in the morning to to to provide for young people in this instance to tackle the hardship of poverty yes please Louise yeah I mean actually yeah we have to we we are very aware of that balance between how much we spend on raising funds and how much we obviously spend on our charitable activity and you know that's something that we keep a very close eye on and actually I would say you know when it comes to something like PEF funding where it's school by school we've we've made a conscious choice not to pursue it because we don't want to put our resource into trying you know we would need a much bigger team to focus on that fundraising and those kind you know if we were going to try and have 300 relationships with 300 secondary schools so you know where we can you know we haven't we have to follow the money a little bit so where we do have a relationship and we can access that obviously we do but we are not going out to try and because for exactly that reason that we would end up spending a lot more on people like me and less on people like our youth development leads who are out helping young people and that's that's where we want the money to be at the front line we don't want it to be on us administrators so um so we have to we have to make a really conscious choice on that but it but that is part of the reason that we um you know it does mean that our programme and our delivery doesn't grow at the same rate because we're not able to secure the the funds to grow it so so it's a constant balance I would say thank you Jim I think what um Fergus unit said is important I think it would be very welcome for us to get more sustained guaranteed funding for services on a three-year term um I would have to say our experience in Abelour is that we've had a lot of stability in terms of our funding coming in we've closed very few services in the last six or seven years through that I think sometimes services can close because good services can close through bad decisions that's always kind of really regrettable but we've really focused on a good relationship management and trying to deliver what we say we're going to do and we believe that is a kind of that does help with sustainability we've got some four-year contracts for some of our family support services down in the board as we got a funding arrangement for that and it was based on delivering I think the challenge for the overall sector is that in the third sector if we're not delivering our services will probably be cut will probably come to an end I think in the statutory sector you know services kind of endure over years and I think what we need to get to is the position where there's an ability to not just add additional investment but disinvest in some things that maybe don't work that maybe don't deliver and you know that's a challenge I think for the statutory sector to say well you know we're going to change this we're going to stop doing this and there's certain things that kind of prevent that but I do think to shape a kind of different future in terms of the things we want for children and families in Scotland we might need to look at disinvesting in some of the things we do and reinvesting that money in innovative and new things that are proven proven to work in Abilaw we've invested our own money in developing services you know we do that sometimes in partnership will pay half the cost of a service with a local authority to establish it we did that recently with a family support service in Balkirk we put 90 000 pounds of our own money in and after a year of delivering it the local authority said this is working we will now fund you for two years and they've expanded it so you know we're prepared to put our money where our mouth is and we're prepared to deliver I think we need to see that across the boards where we know there's kind of reviews are these services still meeting the needs that they're intended to to deliver on thank you Jim Sarah thank you yeah I just wanted to come in to say I think cost of the school day and child poverty action group in Scotland is a wee bit different to the other organisations here today in terms of our funding through the attainment challenge isn't to provide direct services to children and young people but it's about working with schools and local authorities on things like awareness raising professional learning and developing resources to involve their school communities in dealing with financial barriers and good practice gatherings things like that so it's a wee bit of a different service a wee bit of a different project but what what I would say that might be relevant is that I think because our funding has been direct and central from the PIF policy unit and has been focused on national development it has given us the scope to work in a range of different ways with a range of different local authorities and a range of different schools so that's allowed for the spread of cost of the school day approaches in the widest sense throughout Scotland in recent years and I think if we had been busy chasing PIF funding to work specifically in the school or that school then there wouldn't have been the reach and the impact that there has been so far. I would also maybe reflect on the benefit of local approaches, local authority-wide approaches to work like this. We had a partnership with Dundee City Council over three years with local SAC funding and I think we could see the bigger impact that there could be with a local authority-wide approach then there would have been working in individual schools on awareness raising and involving children and young people in this agenda so there is cost of the school days on going in Dundee now because there was a scope for the local authority-wide approach. They've got statements of intent around how they will be removing financial barriers for their children and families, there's an on-going steering group, there's an education officer centrally who sort of runs these things so that's with us having stepped away from that partnership now so it's I think local authority-wide approaches and funding along those lines when it comes to cost of the school day has been really helpful because it means that it can be embedded within the systems that are there already. Thanks. Does anyone else want to come in? Yes, Maureen. I'll be very brief. I think just to highlight, given that this committee is specifically about attainment challenge, there are particular challenges and obviously the biggest chunk of the money is weighted towards PEF so for a third sector that is a challenge and also to say that in terms of one of the unintended consequences so although we've managed to have quite stable contracts across our PEF portfolio when you employ staff and they only know that they're guaranteed work for a very short period of time it's very difficult to to have the sort of long-term planning but also that security because we know that relationships work and if we can have a system which focuses on ensuring that the relationships are at the heart of how we support our children and young people I think we will be getting much better outcomes for families so for me that's just an a wee point that I wanted to make in terms of that insecurity that's going to woven through the PEF system. That's a very powerful point. Bob Doris. Thank you, convener. I see that at some time ago now I think that Louise Goodwood was talking about really good examples of working with families and young people in secondary schools about employability, linking with businesses, CVs, inter-each, being stuck, kind of thing. It's worth noting, convener, that figures out yesterday showed record levels of positive destinations for young people in Scotland above 95 per cent. So we must do something right in schools and I'm sure the third sector are a key partner in making sure we're getting that right. So there's good things happening, convener. I can't help but say at Glasgow we're well above the national average attainment levels which is an absolute significant challenge for the city of Glasgow that young people in deprived communities have really positive destinations. I've got that out of the making here. I wanted to say that. I'm very proud of my local authority. Now, it's how we map the role of the third sector within that and we maximise the benefit of the third sector, of course. I see that in 2020 an analysis of PEF showed that 43 per cent of headteachers said that they were collaborating with the third sector, which means that over half are not collaborating with the third sector. Now, there is a contradiction and a tension, of course, because we want headteachers in the school community to have the flexibility to spend that PEF money as they see fit, but I would want to assure myself that they are maximising the wider opportunities out there, including contracting the third sector. So I would certainly welcome some comments about if there's a need for more of a formal role in how schools engage with the third sector without any guarantee that the third sector will necessarily get funding from PEF, but if there's more of a formal structured process that should be gone through in spending PEF. Any comments on that would be welcome. Given that I mentioned Lee's good lid, I think that it's only right that Lee's would respond to that first. I think that what we find is that it's quite a complex landscape education in terms of you've got Education Scotland, you've got the RICS, the regional improvement collaboratives, you've got the attainment advisers, there's lots of different bodies. I would say that pre-Covid, and Maureen and I are both part of this, there was a strategic group that came together with Scottish Government and Education Scotland, a group from the third sector to have that conversation and strategic overview of what was happening and how the third sector could engage with education. That fell away and then understandably focus has changed over Covid, but for me there's just something really challenging in how we navigate that. I don't know how head teachers do what they do, they're amazing. As someone in the third sector, where there's so many offers and organisations, I suppose for me it's about how do we make it easier for head teachers to see what's available because they can't be an expert on everything. Is it that that sits at that local authority level in terms of guidance and co-ordination? I think that there's just a lot of different forums and ways that, again, it comes down to that thing of how do organisations, how do we make sure that we engage in the right places to share what we have to offer and how do we make it as simple as possible for head teachers to understand what impact is. It always comes back to that. How do we show what works and get the right evaluation so that they can make an informed decision? I don't know if that answered the question. Perhaps there's not an ideal solution to this. I'm just trying to work out how we ensure a consistent engagement with head teachers in the third sector in the spending of PEF and the procurement of services. In my experience, my local head teachers are very well aware of the really good quality third sector organisations that exist in North Glasgow and they make use of them. Morrin McIntyre has a suggestion on how we formalise or put structures around it because the appeal today is that schools and local authorities should be using the third sector more. How do we do that without telling them what they have to do? How do they keep that flexibility to spend the money as they see fit and still work collegiantly with the third sector, which I have to say in my area that I'm sure they can do? Morrin, do you have any suggestions? I mean, it's probably not a popular one. I do, because I think that the empowerment agenda does very much push that delegated authority down to school level, but I know certainly and just, I suppose, reiterating a wee bit of what I said earlier, I do think that there is an important role for local authorities to help around the co-ordination and not just in relation to what happens in school but the interface with other bits of activity that happen across children's services, because otherwise it can all feel a bit bitty and fragmented. Where we have the biggest successes is where there are really strong partnerships, both at the front line, a team around the child individual school, but right up through the structures that are in place with local authority colleagues and education social work, educational psychology, CLD, that's where you get the biggest bang for your buck, when everyone is working collaboratively together to the same end. That's helpful. How do we get to a structure around this without a bureaucracy and still having that local autonomy? I think that Sarah Spencer made a similar point about the local authority and schools and getting the balance right and how you can procure around that, so maybe I'll go to Sarah. Was it yourself that said that? No, no, no, no. Can I quickly come back in with one thing? I think that there is something about equity, so I can give you an example where a child or a young person, we've got examples of this happening where somebody may move into kinship care, for example, in a local authority, be getting a piece of support from somebody in a school. That support doesn't follow that child, because another school might have a different range of priorities that they're funding through their pay funding. For me, it's like we're seven years down the line, there's some things we know that are essential that should be in place for every child and every family, because we've learned an awful lot over this period, and I'm just wondering whether there should be a bit more focus on putting some of those big rocks in place, but still allowing for some flexibility at an individual school level? I think that morning, Macatheon makes a real interesting point. It's one that I've had made to me before, but the money doesn't follow the child. It's an indicator of need within a school and poverty within a school, which gives a financial sum to be spent on raising attainment within a school, so it doesn't follow a child clearly when they go to another area. Is there something around co-production that could be a way forward when we've got PEP, I think, guaranteed over three-year periods to allow greater planning? Of course, school headteachers will want to talk to their parent council, the wider school community, and they'll want to make decisions based on what is in the best needs of the school, which sits within that wider community where the third sector is part of. Is there any good example of co-production with the use of PEP monies or is co-production something that we should be talking about more in relation to directing some of those funds, keeping the school still in charge of deciding how that money is spent, but knitting in some of those third sector organisations? Maybe it's pie in the sky, Sarah. I'm trying to find a way to get a solution around some of that. I believe that there are lots of different pieces of information and data and knowledge that would inform what PEP is spent on in a school. I think that what is really important is that part of that data comes directly from children and young people and families on low incomes. The cost of the school day process is at the heart of it. It's about talking about costs and where they might cause issues or problems in the school with children and young people in a non-stigmatising way. It's doing the same with their parents and carers, given the opportunity to raise mentioned areas that might be of concern when it comes to costs and where financial support might be required. The whole process is about having children and families' voices at the heart of that in terms of identifying problems and solutions, because some of the schools are often very aware of what their financial challenges and barriers are for families that are coming in. It is an increasingly difficult situation for families, and lots of the other witnesses have mentioned that today. It's a really difficult situation financially, and schools are seeing that each and every day with their children and families' financial circumstances changing over the last couple of years or worsening. Having children and young people in families at the heart of looking at financial barriers and saying what should happen in their schools is absolutely crucial. It's advised that part of your pest spend should be decided through participatory budgeting processes around that. There are examples to draw on in Midlothian, of some work that we were involved in there, a few years ago that was led by Payment Councils. I think that there are really exciting opportunities that we can see with pupil equity groups, pupil voice groups that are so common in so many schools, and lots of cost of the school day groups that are springing up at the moment. There are loads of opportunities there for schools to work with their children and young people and their parents, parent councils and other parents to get the solutions right in school. If we are talking about the value of the third sector and some of the organisations that are speaking here today, if we are talking about what value they have, then listening to children and young people and their parents and carers about what value those services have brought to their lives and their school experiences and how they are able to engage with school, that is really powerful in and of itself, and I think that we should be listening to that. Thank you, Sarah. Finally, convener, Jim Wallace, where I started my line of questioning, was 43 per cent of head teacher report using the third sector. I know in my area that they are hugely valued and many head teachers know the value of the third sector. How do we increase that from 43 per cent and have more significant involvement in a way that keeps schools and head teachers in control of the spend? I think that the challenge is just the capacity, I think that all the organisations here, I do not think that any one of us would have the capacity to engage with every school in Scotland around co-producing services for PEF money, because it is just an immense undertaking. Where we have gone into this arena, it is probably where we have already got a footprint of services, where we have got established family support and other services there and we have got a legitimate place to come on board. There would be areas where, if we were coming in to try and establish this without that kind of foundation of our work, it would be very difficult for us to do that. I think that what I would commend is that, in Dundee, they have developed a kind of alliance model where the third sector partners are collaborating very effectively together and not trying to get out of this competitive scenario where different third sector partners are competing for funds from the same sources. The work in Dundee is probably quite important to how we go forward with things, because there is the opportunity to say that we are all here around the table, but action for children is the best place to deliver this, or when others can come into this space and try to use our resources as effectively as we can rather than chasing after money, which is not a helpful way to go about things. Thank you, Jim Wallace, for a really good example and practice of how some of that work could be done, but no further questions. Jim Wallace, we have got you. You mentioned yourselves, Barnardo's. One of the things that Robertson Trust talked about in their submission to us was that there was some displacement in the third sector with the larger charities basically rolling over the smaller ones. Jim, would you like to comment on that? Have you witnessed this? Are you seeing the marginalisation of the smaller charities that the Robertson Trust talked about? We would not want to see that. I think that there is real value in the very small charities, as well as the bigger charities. Certainly, we have done a bit of collaborative work in Highland and we are working with Barnardo's and Action for Children, but we also have Highland Homeless Trust working with us, too. There are good charities like the Kalman Trust, so I would see the value of the small charities. I think that it is hard for them, at times, to get into the space. I think that we need to get this understanding that we need to take some of the competitiveness out of it. The third sector's biggest challenges were constantly urged to collaborate, but we are also forced in certain ways to compete in tender situations. That is very difficult. Some of the tenders that we put in—I assume that Barnardo's—are pretty complex undertakings. I think that some of the smaller charities would really struggle to have the resources and the capacity to enter that phrase. They probably need some assistance, but we certainly see the value of small charities and we would not want to dominate them. I think that the space should be encouraged. We have partnerships with a number of small charities across Scotland, and it is very helpful to us to have those grass-roots connections. The tendering process is supposed to create a level playing field, but, in fact, the way that you have just described it is almost designed to create an uneven playing field, because smaller charities cannot get— I am sorry, convener. I think that some tenders are very complex and demand a lot of resource and time to go into them. The bigger charities have their development units around working on those things, and they have people that they can pull into, teams that they can put behind that work very hard for smaller charities to do that. I have certainly spoken to some who have said that we just cannot possibly enter into that. I suppose that the best thing that we can do is try to partner them within our tender submissions to include them with that. I think that if local authorities encourage that, as they sometimes do, that would be a positive step forward. There is a real risk that this tendering process goes the same way as commercial tendering has gone with local authorities and other public bodies, where it becomes harder and harder for small businesses to get a fair share of what is available in the public sector. The same thing could be true in the third sector, so that is something that we should take note of, particularly in the area of the attainment challenge. Thank you. I am going to turn to Stephanie. Thank you very much, convener, and thank you all for being here this morning. Just before I start, I have got three questions here, but it is really good to get that clarity as well about the idea that our teachers are trained primarily as educators that work with a larger classroom full of pupils there, and that remains their priority. The third sector organisations get children who are actually struggling to a place where they are ready to learn, so I think that it is really, really good to see that today. It is also great as well to see poverty being put absolutely front and centre of that, because the impact, we call it the poverty related attainment gap for a very, very good reason. The impact of poverty on our children is absolutely devastating in our families going forward. I have got three questions here. The first one is about parental mental health, and I will target that at Sarah, if that is okay. How important is parental mental wellbeing and how big an impact do the practical and financial support that families get? How big an impact does that have on their children's learning? I know as well that we have said that that is something that can be quite difficult to measure. It is not always easy to put it down there, but I want to know, do you see a substantial improvement in children's learning, their progress and their behaviours, etc? Yes. We all know that poverty has a huge impact on parental mental health. The stress, the pressure, the anxiety of living in poverty and trying to provide the basics for your family and having that as a constant weight on you all the time is really, really dangerous for families' mental health. I think that there is an interesting link there with how that plays out in schools for parents and carers. I think that I mentioned in my written submission, we did a bit of research recently for a resource called talking about costs and money at school, because we were quite aware that it is a difficult thing for schools to bring up with parents, and it can be difficult for parents to bring up concerns around costs or financial supports with their schools, so we wanted to dig into that a wee bit more. When we asked parents and the research that we did, how did it feel like, what did it feel like if you were ever engaging with your school on those sorts of issues, we were really struck by what came back. Lots of responses that I think just show the power of shame and stigma that surrounds poverty. It was people talking about whether they had good experiences or not with their skill, they were talking about the feeling of going to do that, go to talk to their skills. It was about fear of judgment, it was about thinking their child was going to be judged as a result of their financial situation. It was feeling guilty, they could not provide what was needed for their child, whether it was a trip for resources or whatever it was they were approaching their school about. The huge sense of guilt, shame and fear, and that is not how we want to see parents and carers' relationships with schools being. It all ties together into mental health, stigma, shame and arena for families. What we see all the time in terms of what schools can provide for families is that practical help, that kindness, that understanding of the challenges that families are going through. I think that, especially in lockdown, we saw the huge lengths that many schools were going to support families to apply for entitlements and to signpost or help with financial support, because so many families had drops in incomes, job losses and so on, as we know. Along with those negative, fearful and shameful and stigma-filled responses that we heard, we also heard about the brilliant things that schools were doing for families. The impact that that was having on how parents felt, there was a quote that sticks in my mind. The first is that we really notice when our schools are trying to help. Another one is that it feels like they have got on my back. That is a really powerful thing for families in the context that many families are living in in the moment in terms of financial circumstances. There is a clear link between good relationships, good parental involvement and engagement and better learning for children. I think that looking at stigma and how it affects the uptake of support in all senses, but in entitlements in particular, I think that looking at stigma and how it affects things and looking at ways in which that can be reduced, I think that that is essential in this. That is great. I have a look at your planning and monitoring paper work that you use to move young people forward. It is quite similar to some of the work that I have done in my past co-ordinating education initiative projects. I wonder if you could tell me a bit more about how co-production, power and control, given that back to the young person about their learning there and about what impact that is making and how well that is helping you to be able to start measuring some of that stuff and how we could look at improving that going forward. Thank you, Stephanie. We were still fairly early days with this. We were prompted with the pandemic because a number of the children that we are working with are in our residential houses because they cannot live at home. When the lockdown started, I thought that the resources were going to become a bit like pressure cookers with children not being able to get out to school and not being able to do a lot of their other activities. However, what we actually observed was something different, really, that all the children were in the same boat and they were a bit more relaxed. School for certain children is a place where there is quite a lot of tensions, anxieties about going to school and learning outside school for that period was actually quite positive for some children. They were saying that they were able to get through more work and do things differently. They started their school day a bit later and there were a variety of different things that were put in place that were flexible and personalised. We put a group together to look at how we might work differently and create a different learning environment that meets the needs of those children in a more flexible way. To do that, we have involved young people and our staff in discussions about how we can approach this differently. We have had some support from a clinical psychologist who works with us. It is really about trying to understand all the barriers that are there in place that affect children's learning from emotional ones around their low mood, low motivation and high levels of anxiety. All those things cannot just be wiped away but we can look at how we can address them and then actually create a better place for children's learning. We are still on this journey. We have not quite finished that review but we have had a few examples where we have set up individual plans for children and we have seen some progress with that and hopefully we will report more over the coming months and years on that initiative. Many years ago, there were off-site provisions for children and they got cut down. Some children do very well in mainstream school and that is obviously the best place but we need to look at how we can create the right environment and changes in schools that meet the needs of all children. Some of our young people spoke about learning support bases in schools and the stigma there because sometimes it is seen that the bad children are going to these bases and we need to find a way to remove that and create a learning environment that is positive. If it is not about taking difficult behaviour out of a classroom and locating it somewhere else in the school but actually looking at that child's learning needs and building on that, I hope that answers your question, Stephanie. We are not fully on that journey yet, we are just on the road. It would be good if you could keep us posted, certainly. That brings me on to my next question as well about the wider support that we look at in previous evidence sessions. We have been told that wider wraparound support from third sector organisations, health, social work, youth work, autism services, justice services, all of those are crucial to making sure that our children are able to achieve their potential and do as well as they possibly can. We have also got the early years stuff as well, which has been a huge investment in the early years of education and attachment, et cetera, as well. I know that Barnadol is doing quite a lot of work around that as well. My question is about how important it is to have that wraparound care and the interagency work, and how can we get that working better? Is there something around funding joint teams or something like that? Is there any innovative ideas that you have found to have worked? I think that that is an important point. Today's discussion is focused on SAC, but the attainment gap starts long before a child gets anywhere near a school gate. I think that the expansion to 1140 hours, although it provides some support, it is obviously about children having access to nursery care and it is not necessarily about support to parents and about strengthening that attachment relationship and providing building the capacity of families to be able to give their very young children admission learning environments so that, when they turn up to school, the gap could be not as big as it is currently. I know that, from speaking to any early level teachers that you come across, they will certainly say to you that they would love more intervention, more support to be available to families at that earlier stage. Obviously, by the time that somebody gets to P1, some of those patterns are, unfortunately, pretty entrenched. I suppose that I have been talking a couple of times today about that wider system and how important it is in providing that network of support to children and young people, particularly children and young people, where there is a level of complexity, where they may need additional supports that are beyond what is available universally in order to fulfil their potential. I think that those relationships locally are essential. Just prior to Christmas, we had done a survey with all of our schools-based staff about what was it like, the new normal, what were the issues that were coming up for children and young people now that they were back in school. The biggest concern of all of our staff was the mental health and wellbeing of children and young people. I think that it would be fair to say that, even children and young people who, prior to the pandemic, were managing fairly well, are now—there is a significant cohort of those children and young people who have been really impacted by lockdowns. Certainly, we have noticed more families where there is a child with additional support needs coming to our attention because, through the pandemic services that were previously in place, for understandable reasons had to pull back from face-to-face contact with families. Families have often been feeling a bit left and abandoned to navigate a difficult period in time without the support that they feel they need. All of those things are really important. Given the mental health concerns, I do not need to tell anybody here that the waiting lists are enormously long, but from our experience on the ground, we think that a lot of those children and young people sitting on waiting lists could benefit from a community intervention. They may not need a CAMHS clinical intervention, but if we had holistic support available at a universal or enhanced universal level, we would be able to support them rather than them having to sit and wait for months and months and months only to be seen as not fitting the CAMHS criteria. We would really like to see some of the things that we know work and that are important to fulfil the needs of children, young people and families and make them available right across our communities rather than the individual school approach, because we know that there is a need there. We could support the whole system in trying to get kids who do not need CAMHS into a more community-based intervention at a much earlier stage. There are lots of really big and important issues that you touched on there. We have heard as well other evidence that we have had the suggestion that we should be focusing on our children with additional support needs. We are 30 per cent now that that should be the main focus. All children will benefit from that, so it is really interesting to hear. I will go back to what you said earlier. There has been that real focus on wellbeing in people and their places. There is a drive to co-locate services in communities. I know that North Lanarkshire Council, for example, is looking at having hubs where you are dropping your children at nursery and they are looking for that lone parent not to go home and be isolated but to get involved in either education or in exercise or a cafe and social events and stuff there as well. Is that the right way forward? What should we be looking at to make sure that we are complementing and supporting the work that is going on with schools and the third sector organisations? I think that those conversations need to take place with local communities, because they will keep us right about what would work and what would not work. However, I definitely think that, from the feedback that we have had from families that we support, people want spaces in their local community that are non-clinical and that they can go and get a range of different supports from very light touch signposting to more intensive support. However, in a way, we would never bad any of our services. We may, for example, get funding to support families affected by substance use, but we would never bad a service in that way because we want to remove any stigma. Truthfully, families have got a right to support. Any family can find themselves in a set of circumstances where they need a wee bit of extra help for a short period of time or a long period of time. I think that the promise is challenging all of us to think about what additionality we can bring to try and prevent families from being broken unnecessarily, what we can do to strengthen families and keep people together, but it won't happen without some additionality at that universal or enhanced universal level. That's great. I'm just making an appointment. No more questions, but the pandemic has been something that's just shown all of us that the rug can be ripped from under any of our feet at any time and that we shouldn't be blaming people, we should be holding our hand out to help people. Thanks very much. Sarah, sorry, Sarah. I keep seeing your name and wanting to say it the wrong way, I do apologise. Sarah? Very annoying name, I know. It's me being very dense. I just wanted to make the point that money is important here. Getting money into families' pockets is absolutely crucial to everything that we're talking about today. It helps with the mental health difficulties that I was talking about earlier. It reduces stress and pressure. It means that families don't have to cut costs on things that nobody should have to cut costs on, on essentials for their families. We know that there is a direct link, a causal link, between more money in families and children's outcomes and attainments. That's why focus on income needs to be core to everything that we're doing. I think that there are really good examples of partnerships in schools that look to boost incomes, to maximise incomes. I think that, in your last session, Laura from the Poverty Alliance had mentioned the maximise project in Edinburgh. There's also the FISO project in Glasgow that some of you might be familiar with, which is about having financial inclusion support officers based within schools and working in a range of ways with families. That has seen quite astounding financial gains for families and has also had an impact on relationships within the school in terms of the ways of working. In fact, I was at an online conference type thing the other day, just anecdotally. A teacher was saying that, in her primary school, she had a family who had issues with attendance and various other things, and she tried absolutely everything to improve the child's attendance. The one thing that made a difference was that the FISO project was a Glasgow primary school. It was having that person there doing the benefits check and getting more money to that family. She said that attendance was fine. After that, there were quite practical barriers to that child getting into school on time. That's quite telling of the impact that that can have, those approaches. There's also a lot that can be done in schools quite straightforwardly and simply in terms of very clear open communication about financial support available and support available in the school, for example subsidies for trips and things like that. That universal information sharing, because as Stephanie says, the rug could be pulled out to many of us at the moment and always could be. Lots of things that can be done in schools, lots of partnerships that can be made to help families get that money into their pockets. I think that it's important that there's a consistent offer in across schools and across local authorities in terms of that support being available, which probably isn't there at the moment in terms of financial information and support. I just wanted to follow on that point that Coursera was making about money. We have an initiative in Tayside that's currently funded by the Robertson Trust and Cora, where we're looking to address. In our family support services, we're providing emotional and practical support, but we're wanting to add a dimension of financial support to families as well, which is looking at their benefits and working with welfare rights and writing off some of the debt. A lot of the debt that families are engulfed in is public debt, council tax arrears and rent arrears. Local authorities have discretionary powers to help families financially through section 12 and section 21, so there are opportunities to use that. The thing that we're testing out is if we can help families emotionally and practically, but also help to address the impacts of poverty and debt on them. We can maybe put them on a course in life where there's sustaining outcomes in the long term rather than just helping families out of difficulties in the short term. We have very early days with that, but we paid off some debt for a woman who had many issues in her life with her children. She started to have a much more positive outlook about trying to get a different housing for herself and her children and starting to train as a hairdresser, so she'd moved from a point of really kind of despair and no hope to a point where she was actually seeing a future for herself. If children are living in that family where there's just the constant pressure of debt and things, it's a pretty toxic situation to be in. I think that being able to address family finances and do that, I think that we had some links just this week with the WISE group who are linking in with the big energy companies and trying to get some debt written off for families as well. These are the things that are really important as well as just the direct services that we're doing. Eleviating some of those financial burdens can actually be what's most important, as Sarah says, to families and problems that are kind of stuck, like the children attending school, can disappear overnight, so absolutely. Thank you, Jim. I appreciate that round of questions and answers. Now we turn to Natalie Dawn, who will be followed by Willie Rennie. I think that Willie will probably be the last member of the committee to lead the questioning, because Oliver Rennie has not returned from his break from the committee meeting. So Natalie, over to you. Thanks, convener, and thanks to the panel for all your comments this morning. They've been very, very helpful. I just want to touch on something that we've kind of just discussed, and that's what my colleague Stephanie was kind of discussing around background care and work with different organisations. We've just established and we know that poverty and lack of money are absolutely at the heart of the poverty-related attainment gap. Families have seen their benefits cut this year, the cost of living is rising, food and fuel prices are going through the roof, and I am genuinely, genuinely worried about the impact that this is going to have on our children. Children cannot thrive in a difficult home environment. While we are saying that this is about poverty, poverty stems on to many other issues and can cause other issues as well. I am not saying that this is restricted to families on low incomes or in poverty, but generally it can lead to things such as drug abuse, alcohol abuse, mental health issues, domestic abuse problems and just these kind of problems at home. As I said, children cannot concentrate while all this is going on and families need support with this. Jim, you did touch on this slightly. I'm wondering if you could expand how the panel ensure that your work is aligned with other services and whether you think, I should say, such as things such as social work and health and whether you think that that could go further in terms of things such as debt agencies or women's services or addiction services. I'll come to Jim first if that's okay. I think that you've just articulated the enormity of the challenge and those impacts on children are massive. Those will all impact on their learning. It is important that we don't just focus on the educational support and things. We believe that the hours that children are in schools are a small part of it, so being able to get the right support to families and address those issues and your right spirals, if families are in depression, you could see domestic abuse and addiction coming in, people getting involved in that and it just gets worse and worse. It is important that we all work together. What I mentioned in terms of Dundee is that alliance and collaboration between the third sector and statutory partners needs to be encouraged more. If we are all trying to deal with things in silos, we have often seen the challenge between children's services and adult care, where the adult care is a bit blind to what is going on for the children and the children's services aren't thinking about the adult care. We just need to get much better kind of collaboration around those kind of challenges for families. There is money being allocated to get significant money being put into family support going forward in Scotland and I do think that that is absolutely essential that we get the right support. The final thing that I'm going to say because I'm sure others will want to comment on it, one of the things that was a big revelation for us a few years back was that it's not just what we provide families, it's when we provide it. We started services where we are supporting families evenings and weekends and public holidays. Families told us that our problems don't wait until Monday morning, so we need to be responsive. Sometimes families need lots and lots of support for a couple of weeks until things get better. It's very key that what we do to address that kind of myriad of problems that you've just articulated is that we root that centrally in what families are telling us about what would be useful for them and what they need to help them to address those challenges in their lives and not be afraid to go into that space. We have staff now that are going in early in the morning to support families, get children out to school. We've got going in in the evenings to support families with bed time routines, as I talked about earlier. It's being able to have that flexible response to families and not have it confined into that Monday to Friday nine to five delivery. Thanks, Jim. It's really important that we don't have all those different organisations working separately with no overall consideration of all the issues that a family or a child is facing at home. I'm not sure whether any other panel members want to come in, but I want to bring Sarah in on that, please. Something that is probably going to be quite useful, or something that makes sense to us as an organisation anyway, is the refreshed attainment challenge within that wider picture around tackling child poverty, national mission to end child poverty. You can't narrow the attainment gap, you can't improve outcomes for children unless you're doing something at the same time on reducing child poverty. All partners across Scotland are working to contribute towards more child poverty reduction targets. We know that what happens in schools, it's just families in schools, isn't it? Everything that's happening to them, there's this interplay and the impact of a wider policy around housing, childcare and social security, obviously. The recognition of that action in schools to improve outcomes, to narrow the attainment gap can't be done single-handedly by schools. There needs to be that wider view, and I think that the recognition of that is really helpful. As I've started to do, we're talking about reducing child poverty as a way of improving outcomes for children and young people. Schools are doing that already, and I think that there needs to be more recognition of that. The drivers of child poverty in Scotland are inadequate income from employment or social security and the cost of living. When schools are looking at what they do through a poverty-aware lens and making sure that they're not adding financial pressures to families, making sure that there aren't any barriers to children participating in all the brilliant things that are going on in their schools, that's helping to bring the cost of living down for families and helping with financial entitlements at school, which means that incomes are being boosted. Schools each and every day are contributing to reducing child poverty. Situating that firmly within the wider work and policy around ending child poverty is really important. As I said, I don't see any other panel wanting to come in on that, but that leads me on to my next question, which is about the cost of the school day. We've discussed the challenges for those on low incomes. It's huge, and the barriers that our young people face in terms of the cost of the school day. I note in the written evidence that CPAC has welcomed the Scottish Government commitment to policies around digital inclusion, the curriculum cost removal, trips and activities, and the local examples that were given in the evidence were helpful as well. With the cost of living soaring, I only feel that those barriers are going to be strengthened going forward. I'm just wondering if I'm directing this to Sarah, if you could expand on the areas that you believe should be a priority going forward in relation to the cost of the school day. Do you believe that the implementation of those—we talked a little bit about stigma earlier—was more stigma for parents? I'm quite interested in those policies being carried out in a way that reduces stigma for children, too, and focuses on that. I wonder if I could elaborate on that. I know that there was a lot in that story. The things that would have an impact are at different levels. At national policy level, we welcome all the commitments that the Scottish Government has made. Policy-wise, policies are going to reduce barriers for children and young people at school. One that we would point to as being quite urgent would be the roll-out of universal free school meals in primary schools, which, as you know, was promised for August this year but has been delayed. We just can't underestimate the value of that support for families, especially in the context that you are talking about in relation to the cost of living crisis and pressures from all sides for families. Speed and urgency on that is really important, along with all the other commitments that have been made at a national level. At a local level, I think that what might be helpful. I think that we have quite a lot of learning about what works to embed and help to sustain some of those approaches at a local level. I would like to see that spread and shared and understood and taken on things like real senior leadership at a council level for this kind of work. The resources to help to push it forward in local areas are really important. Although each school situation is going to be quite individual and the challenges are going to be different in every school and in every area, there are some real shared challenges for schools when it comes to the cost of the school day. I think that there can be some really helpful shared solutions at local authority level. I think that local leadership can help to support all the great work that is going on in schools already. The risk is that, if there is not that local approach, it can be pockets of good practice and schools working in silos. Maybe there is great practice there, but it is not being spread. I think that there needs to be more of that. You mentioned reducing stigma for children and young people in schools. I think that that is absolutely critical. We are talking about the cost of the school day around reducing costs and reducing financial pressures on families. Part of that is absolutely about stigma for children, because that can have a hugely damaging effect, feeling different, feeling other, feeling not able to take part, not part of things with your peers. I think that reducing costs is part of it, because there are fewer opportunities for children to feel different if everyone is doing the same kinds of things. That might be about reducing costs, it might be about covering costs for children and young people, for things like trips and activities and clubs and so on. I think that the way that things are done in schools has a direct impact on the stigma that children feel. Having that awareness that stigma can exist for children and young people on lower incomes is critical for a step within that. I think that adults are deciding how we reduce stigma for children and young people, but we are probably on to plums a wee bit with that, which is why the groups that I mentioned before in terms of people voice, people equity, social justice groups that exist in schools, I think that they will be able to tell us best how stigma is reduced for them. That is an area that we are really interested in looking at me, but more with children and young people. That is a very broad, long answer for you. No, that is really helpful. I think that the stigma thing is really important. You mentioned free school meals. It is about the way things are acted out and the way things are done within schools. I remember when I was in school, the way you got your free school meal, you stood in a separate queue and got a dinner ticket and you were very much in the small group of people that had a dinner ticket. It is nice to know that things like that are phased out now, but it is so important that we continue to work with young people, as you have said, and discuss it with them about how we can make sure that that is reduced. Sorry, I am conscious of time. I am happy to leave it there unless any other panel members want to come in. I appreciate that very much. Our final question round is led by Willie Rennie. Thanks for all your evidence this morning. I think that it has been very compelling. I am interested in just trying to be precise about what we want to change about the attainment funding, because we are spending hundreds of millions of pounds on that, and we need to know that it is working effectively. I take all the points about the wider society. I take all that, but this is hundreds of millions of pounds that has been spent directly with councils and with schools, and we need to make sure that it is spent effectively. There are references in the written evidence to what things should be done to make it better, what improvements should be done. I would just like to draw those out, and perhaps we could start with Louise. If you could tell us what precisely would you want to improve about the way that we use the attainment funding, how it is allocated, Government policy and all that, what would you like to change? I would say that I would like it to be more transparent and clearer where the funding has gone and what impact that money has had. I say all of this caveating as that information might be out there somewhere, but it is not easy to find if it is. If it is out there, let's make it easier to find so that we are really clear on what works and what is having an impact. I would like there to be a greater connectedness from the education system with the third sector. Again, that happens in pockets. I have heard in the last session about Northern Alliance and the Dundee Alliance, and that is great, but how can we get more consistency and greater visibility of how the third sector can be part of the conversations? Do you talk about regional and national forums to share best practice? Is that what you mean? Why do they not exist, do you think, just now? The regional improvement collaboratives exist. My sense is, and this is speculative, but what I find is often that education looks within education and not always outside of that, so that kind of encouragement. I know that it is always a bit like Bob was talking about. How do we get that balance between enforcing, which is not what we want, but encouraging and making some of that encouragement stronger around working with the third sector and really understanding what the third sector has to offer and can bring? I suppose that if I am First Minister for a day, I am going, is it about the third sector having a direct route to the attainment challenge so that we can, for me, it is about how can we stop talking about funding, so it is about what is the best opportunities for young people. In some ways, if there was enough funds for interventions that we can see work, can we make it that we are not imposing them on schools, but that schools can choose to have them if they wish without that third sector organisation having to go four different places to try and fund that? How do we take that? I am not giving you a direct answer. Jim, do you want to come in next? Yes. I think that it is a difficult challenge in terms of governance because we have put it down to the low level of every school. If the local authorities had had the money and were then accountable for reporting to the Government on how it had been used and where and the word clarity on that, that might have been a useful way to go. I suppose that the danger of that might have rubbed away some of the control of individual schools to do it. I do not think that you cannot have your cake and eat it, which would be my feeling. If you want governance on it that is at a higher level, you need to have some sort of mechanism that it is reporting through all the local authorities back on what every initiative is doing. I am not sure that that is there at the moment. We can report on the things that we are funded for and whether that is successful and whether we see the benefits of that. How is that assembled in a more macro level? I am not sure how that works. What are the key global measures of success that are there for that? I suppose that the main one is that we see a narrowing of the attainment gap that is measurable. I think that it is quite hard to wind that one back. It is a decision to put it out and make the decisions in the schools that the head teacher had, the power to choose how best the money was spent. We really want to know how, on a macro level, that is affecting. We are missing governance loop in that for me, I think. Okay, thank you very much. No, no, it is very good. Maureen, do you want to come in? Probably along some of the same themes. Things I have probably already mentioned today, so longer term funding so that we can actually have an embed into school communities and embed change over time and sort of link to that, how that links at a local authority level. You also have that strategic link and that idea that we use the totality of our resources in a strategic and coherent way that makes sense. In your evidence, you say that it is not clear, because Bob rightly pointed out that it is now going to be three-year funding on the PEPF, but it is not clear whether that is feeding through to you getting three-year funding. Why is that? I do not think that there would be an expectation on schools that they need to commit to a three-year. I think that woven into the guidance is very much if something is not working, stop it and try something else. Now, nobody is going to advocate you through good money after bad. However, some of the complex issues that some of the children and young people and families have, there is no quick fix. It takes a long time to build the relationship, to build the trust, to get the right support in place, to take the child or young person family on a journey that ultimately improves their outcomes. That probably comes back to part of the best practice sharing that Louise was talking about, that collaborative thing. How do we make sure that head teachers and third sector organisations and everybody else who is involved in that is sharing that understanding that you need to commit to now that you have the opportunity to commit to longer-term funding, that perhaps that is an example of best practice? I think that some of the measurement around SAC has been quite weighted towards academic, about literacy and numeracy. A lot of head teachers have said to me that I am desperate to focus on health and wellbeing, but not long after returning to school post pandemic, I am being asked to provide track and information about where children are at in terms of their literacy and numeracy. No-one is saying that that is not important, but it is as soon as you are forced to report on certain things, it can wait where you have put your attention. I think that we need to be balanced around that, because this pandemic has had an enormous impact on the health and wellbeing of our children and young people. We need to think about ways of retaining the focus on that. Sarah, I do not know whether you would like to come in on that as well. I think that if we are talking about awareness of poverty and laser-facing and action to tackle some of that in schools, I could go on for hours about all the good examples that are there in terms of schools working to do that. Lots of different interventions everywhere are designed to improve participation for children and young people. If we are talking about those things, awareness and action, I think that there has been real progress in the last few years as part of the attainment challenge on that, in terms of that understanding and that motivation to put things in place. In the DAC evaluation, it had said a similar thing. There has been lots of progress in awareness, but it was still saying that there were gaps and that there were still schools in areas where fewer children are in poverty. It is an on-going process of embedding those ways of working. That needs to continue. There needs to be a strong focus on that going forward. Shaden is learning about what works as well. Those things are more helpful. I want to finish with what summed up how the PEF funding can work very well. When we visited the school in Dundee on Monday, there was this wee boy who described what he was like before and after the intervention. He said, when I used to get things wrong in the class, I used to lose his temper, stamp his feet, he would be out in the corridor shouting and bawling. Now he just rubs it out and he starts again. I thought that summed up brilliantly how this intervention can work and make a real difference for young people. We just need more of that. Fantastic. I cannot think of a better way for us to conclude this session. That was a great anecdote. Thank you this morning to Jim Wallace, Maureen Macathear, Sarah Spencer and Louise Goodlad, who have been giving evidence to our committee as we continue our inquiry into the Scottish attainment challenge. With those thanks and appreciation, I conclude this morning's meeting. We will now suspend and ask members to reconvene on Microsoft Teams for our private session, which allows us to consider further agenda items. Thank you very much and good morning.