SEN funding isn't a bottomless money pit

[Sogfree]

I'll preface this by saying I really enjoy my job working in a SEN school. I care deeply for the children and families I work with.

I've had 4 different conversations this week with parents where they expect an excessive amount of additional resource to be allocated to their child. They expect this as, in their opinion, it's needed. I disagree with 3 of the 4 parents that this is needed.

All 4 of the parents are going to fight the decisions county have made. Their decision to fight will mean county spend more money arguing the challenge.

Services are already broken with the increase in need. Recruitment fails, as there aren't enough speech therapists/OTs/CAMHS practitioners etc to employ.

One parent demanding extra from one of these services means another child gets less.

One parent demanding a child goes to school X at £100k per year when a place at school Y at £30k is going to meet their needs means the child who needs the place at school X doesn't get it, and extra £70k per year is wasted. And the parent keeps their child out of school for 12-18 months whilst they fight for the place at school X.

That's the reality.

Every parent wants the world for their child. I understand that. But taxpayers can't afford to give every child the world.

AIBU - parents know their child best and we should fund what the parents say the child needs

YANBU - there's only so much money to go around and parents need to accept hard decisions have to be made without challenging them

@CleverButScatty there could be numerous reasons. For example, they could think journeys with only one adult, the driver, are too difficult/not safe, or they may not have the money for fuel, or there may be another reason the parent doesn’t want to disclose (such as a health condition they have) so they have used the transport reason instead.

I didn’t say anyone said parents should be forced. I was simply stating they can’t be.

It's not always feasible - if a parent has 2 children at the local primary but their 3rd is at a pmld school on the other side of town, it's hard to be in 2 places at once.

It's usually assessed whether a parent can transport their child as part of applying for school transport - well in our area it is anyway.

No, it was in Kent.

Of course they do. Especially if they like to write disabled children off, it's happened on this thread.

My son may not walk again, we don't know. In some people's eyes, that's enough to not offer him the physio provision he currently gets. He also gets hydrotherapy too.

I don't know how many times and ways I can explain that these parents stated that the reason they didn't was because the didn't feel it was their job. Explicitly.

We were discussing holiday clubs for parents either unemployed or PT.

Really disappointing to see fellow professionals blaming parents for a broken SEN system.

Sorry what have I posted that makes you think I wouldn't want your son to receive the therapies he needs?

The money you might save buy scrimping at education level just gets passed on down the road when these children become adults who are then unable to work, or can only do little and low paid work and are reliant on benefits

School isn't childcare however as children get older child care for children out of education becomes more challenging. My 11 year old obviously can't attend a nursery and any other form of child care isn't designed for older children and would have to be specialist.As it is my child isn't able to leave the house for a range of complex reasons. He should be starting secondary school in September (he's not in a position to obviously due to his mental health) but, hasn't got a place anywhere. Hypothetically if he were able to leave the house everywhere has rejected him stating they can't meet his needs. It's a lot more complex than precious parents wanting the moon on a stick for their kids.Fortunately my partner and I have had reasonable adjustments at work, to both work part time otherwise one of us would have had to give up work

The Tribunals " massively favour" the " sharp elbowed" parents.
Parents go to Tribunal, often at great cost both financial and emotional, stressful, because the LAs act unlawfully.
The LAs aren't putting the children's needs first. They frequently refuse to even assess children for EHCPs. This is not done after a careful consideration of the child's needs, but because they hope that the parents and children will go away.
I think you have to experience the system to really understand how horrific it can be.
As for the poster criticising parents who " work very part time"- I have had to give up my career to care for my children. Often it really isn't a choice.
This thread really is upsetting for parents who have had to fight for every scrap of support.

Because disabled children deserve an education? That's going to vary depending on their needs and sometimes it is going to be incredibly expensive.

My son is in a mainstream school with huge support but obviously that isn't possible for all children.

Exactly. I volunteer for a charity. I hate it when we have to turn people down for grants, but our funds are spread thinner and thinner as local govt slashes is budgets (for everything except SEN and adult social care), further and further.
We have to be able to have conversations about the fact there are tough decisions to be made.

At the moment it feels like when parents are worrying how to pay the rent but their teenager is asserting it's their human right to have the latest iPhone.

I know plenty of parents that transport their child to SEN school themselves. DS3 had a taxi to his first independent but couldn't manage the arrangements for his Yr7 school. I don't really get what the relevance is though.

We are extremely lucky now with that we receive overall

independent Sen school , home education hours for when at home up to 16 hours a week
50 hours a week respite hours a week and 4 hours a week funding for social activities.

but it’s taken 11 years to get to this point. It wasn’t a mum said she wanted this .. here

I have got sympathy for parents of their SEN children I don’t understand why people keep having more children if they’re faced like with these problems Consider carefully what life and world you are going to invite them to

This is the bigger picture that some refuse to see.
Ever dwindling services are only going to put more pressure on families.

Now who's being hysterical and childish. They're a court, they uphold the law, they can't and don't have 'favourites'.

And IF LAs are wasting thousands paying for a placement that could be appealed to the Upper Tribunal because they won't appeal, why are you blaming parents and not the LA?

I was talking about when you said you don't think anyone would have an issue with physio and I was saying that some people most definitely do, I wasn't meaning yourself since you don't feel that way.

and sometimes SEN parents just can't win. Until hydrotherapy became part of his EHCP, I paid for it using some of his DLA and I was moaned at for that by some people on here too.

Yep, we had the same situation, where all the child's therapies and additional interventions were longer than the actual school day, no time for lunch or even to go to the toilet, let alone class time or social time. And this was somehow agreed (at a tribunal) and the special school refused the place as they didn't feel they could meet the child's educational needs in the midst of all these therapies. It was somehow forgotten that the primary reason for schooling is the learning, and therapies are relevant if they help this learning process in some way. However, the school was forced to take them, and by some strange 'conincidence' the private therapy company who wrote all the reports for the tribunal/EHCP were also the company commissioned by the school to provide therapy to their students.

Yes, and surely libraries closing (or hugely reducing stock) , playgrounds and roads not being maintained ,.bins not being collected (a public health issue), that is stuff we should all care about.
My charity I volunteer for is trying to provide funding for a youth group that was a lifeline to about 30 children. It wasn't glamorous, no fancy equipment, just a community hall and some well meaning volunteers who organised activities and snacks for children with very difficult home situations. But the local authority pulled all their funding in the last round of cuts. The children came and spoke to us passionately about what it meant to them.

But our funds are spread thinner as we get so many requests like this.

We used to cover the "nice to haves" after the LA funded the basics for things. Now we can't even help cover the basics.

I would love everyone to have everything they needed.

But if we cant deliver that then we need to have difficult conversations and make balanced decisions

I have 3 children with various combinations of autism/ADHD/developmental coordination disorder/ developmental language disorder.
All three have EHCP'S. we had the same delays and difficulties as everyone else.
I have had two children go through mainstream and one is at a SEND school after his mainstream placement broke down, in my opinion largely because they mainstream school were too busy introducing scratch new uniforms and creating a lovely corporate image to be inclusive.

Can you please explain what experience I need in addition to the above (and 20 years as a SEND teacher, before becoming a SEND lead for children in care) to be allowed a view?

At no point have I criticised anyone for being part time. I did judge parents who work part time, have a car and don't get off their arse to to their child to freely available SEND activities in my area.

Not every child has obvious SEN as small children and not every child is disabled from birth as illness and accidents can and do happen.

There are far, far too many people profiting from the current system to the detrimental of children.

Quite.
The system is being played by businesses that know how to play it