Headteachers use open days to dissuade 'undesirable' families.

[Diamondsgreen]

I've worked in schools for a long time. The challenging schools used open evening to try and persuade families they wanted their DC to attend - empty places cost money and add even more challenge to the school.

However, in every one of the "good", oversubscribed schools the HT used them to put off families they didn't like the look/feel of.

E.g. in a small infant school the HT insisted on doing all the tours herself. Then at any mention of SEND would be most unethusiastic about how the school might be able to meet the child's needs, even suggesting other schools locally who might be better placed to do it.

A Grammar school made a big deal of all the expensive trips and extra curricular activities, you may think to show depth in their offer, but the strategy was to put off less afuulent families.

The one doing the rounds currently is behaviour. The school's (often Trust's) behaviour policy is designed to create a positive learning environment, but the school won't suit pupils or families who will challenge that....

Sensible management or wholly unethical?

Children with send who want to learn and engage are already being failed.

No. You and I are butting heads on the other thread.

I am aware of that, as I have made clear I have had several kids with SEN (my eldest with CP and my two DD's with ASD and G&T). None of them have had behavioural issues.

But.......what I was discussing is the issue that the government are trying to remove SEN schools/provision by the back door by removing EHCPs and forcing kids who really cannot cope into mainstream schools. Why? Because its cheaper.

Not kids like yours or mine who cope ok (at least at school) but the ones who need consistent 1:1 or more. The ones who cannot cope in big busy school environments. The ones who are already suffering major meltdowns. For their own and others safety, they need specific educational environments and these are being eroded for reasons of cost.

We have several teenagers who visit us once a week (I work in hospitality) from the school up the road. They are great and very intelligent but they have two personal assistants per kid because when they can't cope, they REALLY can't cope. That simply isnt manageable in a mainstream school and that is what the government is proposing.

Every child suffers in that scenario.

The main problem is schools not doing what they are legally obliged to. This is where I have found sen parents complaining. The stories are shocking.

I don't understand why you asked if I was being serious when I said why would having a send child in class stop others learning then if you know that it doesn't automatically do so. Sweeping assumptions that all send children are disruptive are not helpful for anyone.

Oracy is an excellent programme, and actually supports children who don't have great language skills when they start school very well - it's using the jargon to bamboozle the parents of those DC which is underhand.

Yes, but it's very difficult to do that when e.g. what they're supposed to do is provide 121 support and the funding for that is £6k p.a.

Because it was in the middle of the discussion about removing EHCP's so I (forgive me) assumed it was referring to that.

What would you like to see happen to disabled children instead?

I'd like to see their education properly funded, but realistically we probably need to change expectations about what that means. It's not helpful for anyone when ECHPs prescribe support that can't be covered by the available funding.

I know of a school where I grew up that did ‘fair banding’ entry tests to ensure a range of abilities across the school on a Saturday to dissuade parents who were less engaged / did not value education / could not get their kids there / focused on sports that may reduce homework time etc.

This exactly. Teachers have to consider the welfare and learning of the entire class.

I can get why they do it tbh. At my son's school the incoming reception year this year was 25% children with SEND. Through absolutely no fault of the children's, this puts a massive strain on the school's resources and creates a dynamic in the classroom that can be difficult for everybody - the teachers, and the children with and without SEND.
I can understand why schools don't feel they can keep pn taking ever-increasing numbers of children who require extra support, when they aren't being given the resources to adequately support them.

By disabled do you mean ADHD, or auditory/visual impairment, or severe physical and/or learning disabilities? Because those are all very different conditions.

@Tunnocks34 Schools are strict because they want good, respectful behaviour and the academic success that comes along with that.

Yes, students both with and without SN are failed when there is no TA available either because funding means there simply isn’t one, or they are busy providing behaviour support.

Provision in F of EHCPs is based on what is reasonably required to meet needs in B. It is not based on what the LA or school wants to fund. Thankfully, otherwise even more DC would be failed. The LA is ultimately responsible for ensuring SEP detailed, specified and quantified in F of the EHCP is provided. That includes ensuring there is sufficient funding. Provision can be enforced if necessary. Lack of funding is not a lawful excuse for the LA’s breach of their s42 duty. EHCPs can be fully funded, but LAs don’t do that unless forced.

It depends on what the condition is and also the individual child. There are many pupils with ADHD who are disruptive, not all but many.

That doesn’t mean the rest of the children also deserve to be failed. They are also failed when schools don’t have the resources to support SEN pupils.

It needs more funding then.

Pupils do need to be silent when the teacher is talking and allow the teacher to actually teach. And that isn’t a given in all schools…. 🙄

I think we should go back to basics and think about the skills needed in the modern world - then think about how schools can meet that need.

we’re in a dangerous place if we ration education according to cost or ability to pass GCSEs. We can’t neglect people just because they’re tricky or dont like to sit quietly all day.

(private schools (who rightly or wrongly produce most of the country’s lawyers doctors senior politicians etc). aim to teach children to be critical thinkers, secure in their own selves and confident in their abilities. I’m not sure children who have been taught that compliance, the right uniform and GCSE passes are critical to their future are going to find life hugely easy if AI is going to replace all the straight forward jobs out there.

I think creative thinkers and those with trades will find employment more easily than those who primarily worried about school uniform rules and passing GCSEs.

This is a pretty bleak thread for a parent with a child with send. Plenty of sweeping generalisations about send children being disruptive, then narrowing that down to those with ADHD. Lovely.

If your child is in a class with my ADHD child then what they might experience is that they all get written instructions, because they are easier to follow, and the teacher might remind my day-dreamy child to start or continue with a task. So hardly disruptive. But don't let the reality of many children with send disrupt the stereotypes that some posters have described.

And no, my child can't go to special school, there isn't a special school that would suit probably the majority of send children, they just need adjustments in mainstream.

@Puffykins Some parents’ thought processes are baffling; it’s little wonder that their children behave as they do.

@Weirdpig Nobody is saying that all young people with ADHD are badly behaved or disruptive, but a larger number of them than the general population do seem to be, in my experience as a teacher, and in many of my colleagues’.

Several people on this thread have made the assumption that SEND = badly behaved and/or disruptive.