Northumberland County Council's Schools Intervention and Support Programme is a preventative strategy designed to support schools who are facing challenging issues.

It has proved a success in recent years – although it relies on a strong partnership between the school, the council and key professionals – and has now been updated.

The council's family and children's services overview and scrutiny committee was told the strategy needed modifying to allow for the introduction of School Improvement Partners, to take account of new powers in the Education and Inspection Act, and to further improve the effectiveness of the support from the service.

Coun Jim Wright, executive member for children's services, said the council had a good record of using the programme intelligently to help schools which could be at risk.

"The key is early identification of schools that might be at risk," he said.

"The standing of this area of service has risen quite a lot over a recent period, demonstrating how schools value it."

The programme sets out clear procedures for the identification of under-achieving schools, timescales for when intervention and support should occur, procedures for those schools which do not make adequate progress, and a focus on enabling schools to become successful.

Letters are sent out by the council to schools which have been earmarked for concern by Ofsted, offering support and help, and Coun Wright said they were positively received.

A report to the committee said the policy aimed at limiting the number of pupils not achieving an appropriate education through failing schools while also reducing adverse publicity for the school and council.

The service rigorously evaluates the performance of all schools in order to determine which are effective and have the capacity to improve further, or those which require additional challenge, support and intervention.

But teacher union representative Elsie Butler questioned whether the reason schools were causing a concern due to bad man-management from headteachers: "If a teacher feels bullied they are afraid to be named. They fear it will make the situation worse."

However, Coun Wright said: "Teaching is a very challenging occupation. I can understand why for some the stress levels are very high and it's difficult to manage that."

"I understand what you mean about bullying but what might be bullying to one person could be exercising authority or management to another."