HMIe report on Educational Psychology Service in Highland (31/03/10)

The HM Inspectorate of Education has published a report (March 2010) on the results of an inspection in January 2010 of The Highland Council’s Educational Psychology Service.

The inspection provides an evaluation of the effectiveness of the Educational Psychology Service in improving the impact and outcomes for children, young people and families.

Three area teams based in six offices in the North Area in Brora and Wick, the Mid and West Area in Skye, Dingwall and Fort William, and in Inverness, covering Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey were included in the inspection.

The key strengths highlighted in the report on the Educational Psychology Service are:

very strong leadership from the Principal Educational Psychologist who had established a clear vision for the service with an emphasis on continuous improvement;
very effective multi-agency working built on established positive relationships;
delivered high quality psychological services which had impacted positively on the full range of stakeholders; and
developed very effective strategic links within the authority which had helped to improve services for children and young people.

The main points outlined for action in the report are that the service should:

continue to develop systematic and robust self-evaluation systems and process to better measure impact and outcomes;
further develop the role of the service in the development of applied research to assist stakeholders in improving their services;
further develop leadership capacity within the senior management team of EPS; and
improve management systems to enable the service to better measure trends in performance over time.

Councillor Bill Fernie, Chairman of The Highland Council’s Education, Culture and Sport Service said: “I am very pleased to see that our Highland Educational Psychological service has been described by HMIe as ‘delivering high quality psychological services’ and had helped to improve services for children and young people. The service is undoubtedly working hard to provide good advice to families and help improve the outcomes for our young people and HMIe have recognised the ongoing improvements.”

The report concludes that: “As a result of the Educational Psychology Service’s high performance and good understanding of their strengths and areas for improvement we have ended the inspection process at this stage.”

A copy of the report is on the council’s website at /learninghere/psychologicalservice/

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