The 'amazing team' that helps asylum seekers and refugees into schools in Middlesbrough

Middlesbrough councillors at the People Scrutiny Panel were updated on the council’s efforts to help children who have moved to the country into school.

Karen Smith, Head of Achievement at Middlesbrough Council, described the Ethnic Minority Achievement Team (EMAT) to councillors. She explained that Middlesbrough was the only local authority across the Tees Valley to have an EMAT service.

She outlined how EMAT works with local schools as well as children and families who are "asylum seekers, economic migrants, refugees, or any other new arrivals”. Ms Smith said: “Since the beginning of this academic year, we’ve had 81 students who have been supported to access a school place, of those, 29 were asylum seekers, 40 were migrant families, eight were refugee families and four were other new arrival families.”

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When it came to feedback and questions from committee members, Labour Councillor Jack Banks cited his work in a previous job, where “every interaction I had with the EMAT team was always positive”. He also said they are “an amazing team of people" and that “they go above and beyond for schools”.

Ms Smith explained that EMAT welcomes families to the town and sets out education expectations, the team also “support families who complete application forms for enrolling in a new school, supports translation” and helps people familiarise themselves with the Middlesbrough way of life.

“23 of our schools buy into the service level agreement and we have support workers who work directly in schools to support learners in situ, that is an increase of three schools from this time last year, which I do see as a benefit. Schools also recognise and value the work the team does in school which is fantastic,” Ms Smith explained.

She went on to give other tangible examples of the work that the team carry out, including how “staff attend parents’ evening to support parents who need that translation facility to understand their child’s academic achievements in school.” As for the other work that the team does, Children Awaiting School Places (CASP) meetings take place every week, in order “to understand why children may still be waiting for a school place.”

Ms Smith further said: “We do have a protocol of around 10 days for children to get into school, but unfortunately there are a number of reasons why that might differ every week and that could include families not taking up their places”. She added there have also been instances of problems with purchasing school uniforms.

Labour Councillor Lewis Young asked if the team were “finding it easy or difficult” to engage with families, highlighting that some of the people moving to Middlesbrough from overseas had “probably escaped various horrors”. Ms Smith responded: “We are very fortunate to have so many bilingual staff in the service” and “the team is so nurturing, and determined to get families settled and children into school”, which means that the team don’t face such barriers.

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