Welcome to the Virtual School: Our role

Under the Children and Families Act 2014, every local authority must appoint an officer, employed by them or another authority, to make sure that it properly discharges its duty to promote the educational achievement of Looked After Children, no matter where they live or are educated. This officer is called the Virtual School Head (VSH).   

Local authorities are charged with ensuring that their VSH has the resources, time, training and support they need to discharge their duties effectively. However, each local authority will do this differently.   

In Hillingdon, we are lucky to have a large team who support the work of the VSH, and we are known as the Virtual School.  Our Virtual School team comprises a variety of education professionals, including qualified teachers, teaching assistants, Education Welfare Officers and some who have experience of Virtual Schools in other local authorities. We all support the VSH in a variety of ways which are highlighted elsewhere on our LEAP website.  

Hillingdon Virtual School is quite different to many other Virtual Schools in that all of our statutory school age and post-16 Looked After Children have an allocated case worker. The Virtual School Officer (VSO) takes responsibility for arranging, chairing and recording all PEP meetings, which may be different to how other local authorities operate. 

We also provide support and guidance for those who are Previously Looked After or currently known to social care on either a Child In Need Plan or a Child Protection Plan.