To think mainstream education is failing SEN students

[Blablablablablahhhh]

I am a teacher - ex mainstream, current SEN - and a parent of an autistic child who attended SEN school and now SEN college. They were quite high level need but now not so much and I credit their fantastic education with dedicated teachers for a big part of that.

I worked in many mainstream schools. I can count on one hand the amount of times I saw a SEN child being provided with a good standard of education . I did a period of supply teaching and went into about 30 different schools and even in the schools where a student was diagnosed , had an EHCP and a 1;1 , they were mainly given ‘filler’ activities or given an iPad to play educational’ games on.

I now work in post 16 with learners with high level needs , some have been in mainstream and I can see the ability they have - they are academically at a primary level but over the few years I have worked there they have made progression ( for example starting on year 2 level work , now on year 5 ) so they are able to learn but in this setting they have high staff levels and teaching styles specific to them individually.

My final straw in mainstream was this and if this isn’t an example of what is wrong , I do not know what is:

I had a child in my class , aged 9, who was autistic. Non verbal. Academically able, but clearly needed 1:1 and support to be able to focus . I had no TA , no support - just me and a class of 30 . I put many strategies in place to support this child . If they could focus on just some key points during input and had a bit of 1;1 support they were completing the work and making progress . An educational psychologist - who came in to school specifically for this child - gave me strategies to use to support them to be able to focus for short periods and I used these and they were successful, I was so proud of this student . One day , a member of SLT came to observe my lesson. During my feedback he said this EXACT thing to me;

“ It’s lovely what you are doing for XX but let’s face it , they’re never going to get it. If they want to wander around the classroom, let them and focus on the ones that are going to”

Sidenote - to make it worse this member of SLT was present for my interview where I spoke about how my own child’s diagnosis and then their progression due to amazing teachers had been my reason for wanting to go into teaching .

It makes me so sad .

That is really sad. The 9 yo you taught sounds like my autistic DC, although he is younger. He understands so much more than he communicates and I see so much potential, it's sad to think that staff at school could think that way about him. They're never going to directly say that to a parent, but I have had a teacher tell me they don't force him to sit. I thought it was for his wellbeing but now wonder if they have just given up.
I've had a conversation with the SENCO about specialist provision,she said it might suit him better but that's the parents choice. When I said well it isn't really my choice, you will need to say his needs can't be met in mainstream she said she couldn't evidence his needs aren't met.

Teacher with 25+ years experience across mainstream and sen.

My last mainstream got it right for the majority of SEN pupils.

Some of my SEN school pupils belong in mainstream.

Many pupils are turned away as there aren't enough spaces in the SEN school. When we're forced to accept them via tribunal, every other child in the school then has a worse deal as resources are spread even thinner.

The system is broken. There will never be enough money from government to meet all the different needs of all students being taught.

My dd is 15 and “should” be in year 10.

she hasn’t been to school since October 16th 2023 which was at the start of year 8.
NOBODY from the LA has been out to see her, despite being told that they would be visiting once per academic year. She was diagnosed with ASD aged 12 just a couple of weeks before her last day and the school were useless.

dd was in top set, very academic and well behaved and didn’t cause any problems at school so she didn’t meet the criteria for an EHCP despite being too anxious to attend school a lot of year 7 pre diagnosis. She had so many struggles and I was forever emailing the Senco who never once replied to me. Once her diagnosis came through I sent it over to school by email and they didn’t even acknowledge it.

Dd became so severely anxious she couldn’t leave the house and I was summoned to the LA for an interview under caution and made to feel like a criminal, was threatened with fines, prosecution and prison and finally got to meet the school Senco who showed up to also put pressure on me to get her back to school.

I reluctantly removed her from school to home educate and made it very clear on the email that I had been backed into a corner. I feel she was thoroughly let down. My older dc went to the same school ( he’s autistic too ) and they were great with him but he’s got different needs and there’s been a change in leadership since.

there should be more schools that bridge the gap between mainstream and sen schools. We have one sen school in our borough and i was told she was “far too able” to attend there anyway.

I feel she’s missed out on so much more than learning and we can never get that back. Sorry for such a long post.