The Annual Review from Hell

[AgnesDiPesto]

DS won ABA at Tribunal a year ago. Everyone agreed at AR today he has met all his targets, made great progress, the programme meets every single need. The LA EP was fantastic saying the LA could not even begin to offer anything equivalent and if he were us he would be doing ABA too. But they are going to do a statutory reassessment anyway.

4 hour meeting. ABA say they had never experienced anything like it and it is a total violation of the COP

They are not even offering him SS (they don't have any for HFA and accept he is now too bright for MLD). They are offering the same sh*t provision from outreach which we already proved produced zero progress. How many times are we supposed to have to prove it didn't work.

They are going to bring in a different LA EP and autism teacher until they get the report they want as the current EP is not playing ball.

Feel totally gutted. Because it means we will have to let him fail again. And he's done so well this year, I just can't bear to lose my little boy again.

And I'm under threat of redundancy, and life is stressful enough. The fu**ers will just keep going until they break me.

Sorry for the rant, just needed to sound off to people who understand.

[silverfrog]

Oh bloody hell, agnes.

what a shitter - "you have done really well, proved your ds can progress, and he has made so much progress that actually, we think we will take his provision away"



is there any way you can say no to the substitute EP? ie, your ds has already been seen, a report can be made, anymore is taking the piss? accuse them of exactly what they are doing - touting around experts until they find one willing ot write what they want to hear?

ask them why another EP needs to see your ds - are they saying the one today is not competent?

[AgnesDiPesto]

Oddly DH said that! 'Are you saying your EP is not competent'. Ha Ha. They are not even saying he has made so much progress they can take away ABA. Part 2 and 3a / 3b is pretty much agreed as unchanged and has loads of very detailed behavioural approaches in there. They are saying he will have their kind of autism provision instead and we have to try it as because he is in school now we don't know the provision that didn't work for 18 months in nursery will also not work in school given there will now be a highly qualified teacher. So time to get out the white pop up tent and let him stim away in a corner again.

I did ask for an indep EP as we have no trust in LA personnel (except this EP who we hung onto for that reason). We actually have a complaint about what happened before in with the council at the moment and its about the outreach team so I said it was only reasonable for them to bring in someone external to give us confidence in the process. But no, they are not going for that, they have handpicked the people who are going to give them the report they want.

There is no significant change in need
He has made more than expected progress

They just don't want to pay

[silverfrog]

bollocks - just typed a reply and lost it.

did they answer the competency question?

do you have a private EP in mind?

if they agree the statement as is, how are they suggesting they deliver behavioural approaches in an EYFS (is your ds goin into reception?) child-led, child-centred (in the worst meaning of those phrases) classroom? since it is still EYFS (if reception), then maybe your previous experience re: failure to progress could still count? after all, there is not a huge difference between pre-school EYFS and reception EYFS...

[appropriatelytrained]

I am really sorry this is happening to you Agnes. The stress must be unbearable. They are utterly disgraceful putting your child through this for quite improper reasons.

Have you got your parental rep involved? I am going to involve an advocate from the start this time just so they know a third party is watching them.

I t is so dreadful as you know you are right about their motives but they are constantly allowed to do these things as there is NO mechanism to make these people accountable. Time and time again, they fail children.

Is the school supportive?

[appropriatelytrained]

Also, who is the 'highly qualified teacher'? Qualified in what? Teaching NT kids?

Many nurseries have staff who are similarly qualified (the early years professional status thing) and often have staff who are better at identifying SEN then schools. I can't see being in school makes a jot of difference.

Get them to set their reasoning out in writing.

[coff33pot]

I dont believe I am reading this

I cannot understand the lengths LAs will go to stop paying anything. They are actually willing to ignore the fact that your DS has done so well? Its madness.....

[signandsmile]

may be talking out of my bum here, but isn't there some guidance about how often pysch tests are done, once you have had them done isn't it supposed to be at least 6 months gap till they are done again? otherwise results are suspect, just thought that might be useful....

[grumpypants]

So you had the meeting today at school, after this the head's report goes to the la with any info/suggestions and the la should react to this. Who said to go for reassessment? Keep any of the info gathered for the meeting in what way have his needs. Changed so he needs reassess?.

[grumpypants]

Terrible punctuation, sorry

[AgnesDiPesto]

his needs haven't changed
that part was agreed
his provision is good
that bit was agreed
they just reckon they can do it cheaper so we have to argue against identical provision to what we argued about last time
the sen manager said it would go back to panel at the start of the meeting before hearing any discussion. all the reports say no change needed.
we have been here before.
its not about the evidence, it all supports ABA, they have none
so they are going to create some...just like they did last time...
its the LA report as he has mainly education otherwise so they get to write their own report

[appropriatelytrained]

I am sorry agnes, that is very stressful. What does the school say about coping even with their 'highly qualified teacher'?

[schmollandresident]

Oh Agnes . Is it worth writing to your MP about it? If they are helpful, it can often cause LA to look again at their decision - for decisions to be viewed as 'reasonable', they are expected to have a reason to re-assess, which they clearly don't if the evidence doesn't point towards a need.

You'll clearly win at Tribunal, especially with todays minutes wrt the LA's own EP's views, but I know that's not the point. Bastards.

[tryingtokeepintune]

Just to say I am so sorry to read this Agnes.

I don't even think it is about saving money now for the LAs but creating work for themselves to justify not losing their jobs.

Any chance they will back down earlier this time?

[eandz]

Agnes

I'm sorry. Sometimes I wish that these people would wake up one day and realize what assholes they are being and just apologize and give us what we need.

I don't want to sit around and beg for services that won't benefit my child...because I don't have the time to do that.

[AgnesDiPesto]

We have to wait and see their plan. Will he keep ABA while they review / reassess, or not. we could have it for another fortnight or 6-12 months til tribunal. no idea. Hard for DS he has just transferred into school beautifully and now another transition

[EllenJaneisnotmyname]

Really sorry to hear this, Agnes. What can I say? The bastards.

[bochead]

pm PipinJo. I could be wrong but I do think she's gone through similar and won 2nd time round too. She's a lovely lady and very generous with her advice.

I wish I could say I'm shocked but the concept of putting the child's needs first is a cruel lie pedddld to sen parents by the media. It's not about that, it's really about a select group maintaining their £60k salaries at all costs. A whole industry of highly paid "experts" would be replaced if ABA gained a foothold. It's a more sophisticated battle than the Ludditte rebellion, but the principle's the same.

[StarlightMcKenzie]

Oh shit Agnes, I saw this but was too chicken to click on it until now, in case it was you.

I don't really know what to say. There is nothing to say though is there except for swear words!

That has to be just about the very worst outcome you could have had. Probably been planning it for the past year. Would that LA EP support you in a tribunal?

I have sought some legal advice recently and they have suggested that I use their (very expensive) team to get ds an independent placement with ABA because although mainstream should work, in reality it just doesn't due to suspicion, lies and repeated threats at AR times.

We are (perhaps stupidly) not taking this advice for the moment but maybe you should explore your options in this way. I know that redundancy threats is hardly the time to looking to spend on huge solicitors fees but perhaps (as the advice I always get on here) you might want to think about moving too.

SOrry if that annoys you. It always annoys me when people say it to me, but from the outside looking in it must look like the most sensible option.

[StarlightMcKenzie]

And I agree with trying that it isn't about the money. It is about the justification of jobs for those people in the LA who's jobs are at risk, and in the long term it is about sending a message to other parents that it isn't worth even the first tribunal.

[AgnesDiPesto]

Yes moving is one of the things on our list of possibles
We actually thought about renting and moving every 6 months so we never got to the end of the statutory reassessment before having to start again [hgrin] although i still can't actually believe it should have to come to this.

Honestly these people would run DS over in a carpark if they could to please their bosses.

However we now have a useless teacher to add to our list of people to fall out with. I spent today in a meeting about our complaint about how they wrote his first statement (which to be fair the LA have sent out to an independent person who was quite nice), chasing up our SALT complaint (months overdue) and nursing the stress migraine from hell.

The teacher has apparently decided DS does not need a 1:1 but she is letting a little girl who treats him as her pet prompt him round the classroom so he is now having this girl take him to put things in his tray when at nursery he was able to do that independently. And she is accepting 1 word answers to questions when his current target is 3 key words. So basically when she thinks she is doing a great job she is actually just lowering his targets back to a level they were at 2 years ago.

[StarlightMcKenzie]

Ah, but now he is 'independent' of adult support and therefore of funnding

[StarlightMcKenzie]

Your poor little boy. Poor sods the lot of them.

And it doesn't have to be this way ffs.