The ISA Programme: A word from the Department for Education and Skills

Information sharing and assessment (ISA) is an area of work developing within the Every Child Matters: Change for Children programme led by the Department for Education and Skills, with local authorities and a range of local partners.

The work comprises

- clarification of how and when practitioners should share information to work together to meet children's needs

- proposals for information databases to assist practitioners to share information

- the development of a common assessment framework to help practitioners work together when children have additional needs

- a range of activities to manage change across children's services to encourage and support better information sharing

This agenda builds on the IRT project initiated in 2002 to support the accurate identification, tracking and referral of children at risk, but is more ambitious in scope.

The intent is to ensure children and young people receive the universal services to which they are entitled, and any additional services they need, at the earliest opportunity.

The role of the trailblazer authorities

A large part of developing the programme has relied on a set of authorities who competed for 'trailblazer' status. There are eleven trailblazers covering fifteen local authorities. The trailblazers were given £1m to try out different approaches and to test the ground around Information Sharing and Assessment.

The trailblazers are:

• Bolton • Lewisham
• Camden • Newcastle with Gateshead

• East Sussex

• Sheffield
• Knowsley • Telford & Wrekin with Shropshire
• Kensington and Chelsea • West Sussex
• Leicester with Leicestershire and Rutland  

Information sharing as an area is so vast and complex that it has meant these authorities have focused on different aspects, such as training or improving referral systems. Within each part trailblazers have consulted widely among different stakeholders, and deeply, to understand what underpins many of the difficulties and issues facing the various practitioners who are likely to use the information sharing system.

Difficulties encountered, such as legal and cultural barriers, have often meant work having to backtrack, and change direction. The role of the trailblazer then should be seen not like an explorer trying to find a route between A and B, but like a mine-sweeper, who has to check a vast area for routes and traps between two points.

With this context then, it becomes easier to understand why the development of specific materials, such as those presented here, have not been the focus of trailblazer authorities. Nevertheless, they are a good source - indeed, probably the best source available - for understanding the issues that underlie the development of such materials and the importance of following certain paths in doing so.