Improved performance management was a key recommendation of the Children's Services Joint Area Review (January 2006). One key action in the resulting JAR Action Plans is 4.2 - 'Provide Scrutiny Commission with the quality of data needed to challenge performance effectively'. Quarterly overview performance reports and quarterly report cards are the means through which this is done.
Performance against a range of CYPS performance indicators is monitored on a quarterly basis through the Council's spar.net system and this information is presented in the form of report cards.
Report cards are a combination of 'hard data' in the form of graphs, based on statistics showing performance against key indicators over time and compared to national averages, core cities and statistical neighbours (where possible) and commentary about the data.
Data is measured either on a quarterly, termly or annual basis. Because of this, some of the graphs in the report cards will not change from one quarter to anther until the end of the year.
The report card products are constantly being reviewed to ensure their relevance and are used by the Council's Children's Services Scrutiny Commission and the CYP Partnership Executive Board to oversee performance; it is the process of challenge that is important.
NB. Due to a change over in staff responsible for the report cards during the first part of 2009, the quarter 3 report cards for 08-09 were limited to two reports - Stay Safe and Corporate Parenting. For quarter 4 08-09, however, a full set of cards is available. These include data from quarter 3 wherever possible.