Effective Practices case study Rhyl High School

At Rhyl high school we see it as our responsibility to remove any barriers our children have to attending school. We do this holistically as an organisation but also offer bespoke support to each individual child. Rhyl High is an 11-16 school in Rhyl, North Wales. The catchment area is in the first and second quartiles of the Welsh Index of Multiple Deprivation and our children are predominantly from low-income homes.

Relationships are everything to us, with our children, their parents, and the community. These relationships were significantly challenged during the pandemic and have not yet fully recovered. We build these relationships through ongoing open communication and by ensuring we remain approachable. We offer support and help without judgment and we build and challenge the expectations of how we want to work together. Our aim is to support all our children through education and enable them to be successful within it. It isn’t about blame or power. It is about helping us to help our learners become everything they can be.

To begin, we always look at the small things we can do:

• Would a class change or a friendship intervention help this learner?
• Would counselling support or youth worker support help?
• Would a short-term change to the learner’s timetable to allow them to build the confidence they need to attend school successfully?

Where additional support is needed, we create and facilitate a joint curriculum offer using our wider wrap around care for Well-being, Achieve and Hafan.

Well-being

• A joint curriculum offer for learners with emotional barriers to attendance
• Staffed by 4 full-time, staff, trained in self-harm, emotional support, trauma informed practice and dialectical behaviour therapy
• Additional staff commissioned to deliver school counselling
• A designated area of the school allocated with 2 classrooms, 4 small spaces and IT provision

This joint offer allows the learner to return to a smaller and more supported area in order to build trust and confidence to attend, before a graduated return to mainstream. The timing of this is based on the needs of the individual.

Hafan (behaviour)

• A bespoke and thematic curriculum offer which supports learners with behavioural barriers to attendance
• Staffed by 3 full time staff, trained in de-escalation, restorative practice and trauma informed practice.
• Additional staff commissioned to deliver engagement sessions in subjects such as sport and gardening
• A designated area of the school allocated with 2 classrooms and a breakout space

This joint offer allows the learner to return to a smaller and more supported area in order to build trust with keyworkers and develop the skills required to remove the barriers and to successful attendance. This is followed by a graduated and supported return to mainstream at a pace that meets the needs of the learner.

Achieve (Learning)

• Joint curriculum offer for children with learning barriers to attendance
• Staffed by 4 full time staff, trained in literacy, numeracy, and basic skill intervention.
• Staff trained in autistic spectrum disorder support and intervention and trauma informed practice
• A bespoke thematic curriculum at the level of the child who is accessing it
• A safe and supported space for non-curriculum time and the opportunity to develop social skills
• A centrally designated area of the school with well-resourced IT

This joint offer allows the learner to return to a smaller and more supported area in order to build trust with keyworkers and develop the skills required to remove the barriers and to successful attendance. This area allows children a graduated and supported return to mainstream or, if appropriate, to have their curriculum delivered fully in this area. This area allows for quiet, small group intervention and for friendships to be developed in a supported way. It supports learners with significant needs to be successful and comfortable in their learning.

What makes this approach successful is that the learners are supported by a specialist team that can meet their needs and gain the trust required to build the relationships the learners need. They never give up on them and they never turn their backs, their only success criteria is the success of the learners.

There are downsides to this approach. It is non-statutory and expensive. We are large school with significant need and we must work in this way to be successful. However, our ability to sustain this offer is defined by our future funding.