To feel like a failure - children out of school.

[Eastereggmadness]

Both my children are currently unable to attend secondary school. One having a mental health crisis and the other extreme anxiety about attending school. They are both autistic.

I really value education and enjoyed school myself. I feel like such a failure that despite my best efforts to get school to put reasonable adjustments etc both my children simply can't cope with it. I always thought we'd somehow get through but I have two children out of school, lonely and with no education. Need to start thinking about ehcps, or home education of some sort. All totally daunting.

How old are your children? Have you had any support at all from school or the local authority?

What adjustments have the school put into place?

I hear you. I’m a teacher with two dc, also both autistic. Dd school refused form year nine. We were lucky she got a place with a medical education team. My ds is coping with mainstream, mainly because he has a great senco and inclusion
centre.

Is alternative provision in place? If not, have you requested it?

On their website, IPSEA has a model letter you can use to request EHCNAs.

please please do not feel like a failure. you are absolutely not.

the system is failing your children, not you. mainstream secondary schools are often sensory nightmares for autistic kids and it is heartbreaking when they just can't cope anymore.

you are doing the right thing by listening to them and prioritizing their mental health over attendance figures. that takes huge strength. school trauma takes a long time to heal so just be gentle with yourself. sending you huge hugs, it is such a lonely battle fighting for ehcps but you are their best advocate.

I feel you. I also work in education but had 2 children out of school at one point.

DC1 needed a change and thankfully settled well at their new secondary school, who were brilliant. And still are.

DC2 was a much tougher nut to crack. Autistic, school based trauma, burnout. Online learning didn’t really work. Ultimately needed a special school placement which we eventually got after he’d been out of school for over 2 years. He’s part time now but we’re hopeful he’ll be able to go full time soon and do qualifications etc.

What never worked was ‘just making them go’, ‘giving them no choice’ or ‘taking away all their electronics’. It needed time, patience and a lot of adjustments.

it was hell though. I went through cancer treatment last year and it honestly felt like a breeze comparatively!

If you do one thing tomorrow get in touch with charity to get help.

I found National Autism Society brilliant.

https://www.autism.org.uk/what-we-do/branches

Im heading in this direction with my autistic dd. She is only 10 but severely anxious and we can’t get her into school at the moment. It is so so hard. There is no road map for what the next steps should be. I was saying to a colleague that if I’d just had my oldest child I would have thought I was a reasonably good parent, when really there is a huge element of good luck, but until youre in the situation you have no idea how challenging it can be and how much it makes you question your own judgment. Which is to say, you are not a failure, you just find yourself in an incredibly difficult situation for which there is no manual and actually very little real support. I wish I had some more useful advice but I feel equally out of my depth.

I hear you. I have 2 autistic DC who both struggle hugely with school, both in the "persistently absent" attendance category.

You are not a failure. This is not on you.

Talk to your SENCO about an EHCNA and if they won't submit then do parent led applications.
But be prepared for a fight, I'm about to submit my second appeal of the process for my youngest. Whose needs can apparently be met "ordinarily" despite not being able to attend for a full week for more than 2 school years now

No you're not a failure. The system is failing your children.

I home educated my two when I was in a similar position to you. I have no. regrets.

See if you can get support via an EHCP.

This isn't anything to do with you. It doesn't matter what you do. Mainstream school without appropriate adjustments is not suitable and they can't cope.

Maybe submit a request to assess for an EHCP yourself. Ask school to fully support it with a statement from them highlighting all the needs.

My son's school have just submitted an application. He cannot cope at all and it's daily detention which just feels ridiculous.

You could start writing out your parental statement gradually. I've just written one. I used the 4 SEN headings to outline strengths and support needs. I've forgotten what they are; cognition and learning is one. Mental health, social and emotional needs is another.

Communication & Interaction and Physical and Sensory are the other 2.

Thank you 🙏.I've just screen shot the 4 for OP. Hopefully will be approved.

So for mine OP I wrote quite a long document but it was basically
Background and history:
The 4 strands; as screenshot above ;strengths needs and then included very specific support requests under each SEN strand.

So under cognition and learning I highlighted all the executive function difficulties my son has and specifically asked for various accommodations.

I have asked for a reduction in timetable, I've asked for lots. I have no idea how much of a chance there is of getting what is needed. A special school is something he desperately does not want - yet, he is not functioning in this mainstream school at all. It's pointless.

I see the biggest struggle with so many of these kids is the level of demands is way too much. If they did half the timetable with the rest of the time used for something suitable, whatever that is, then the build up of demands would be so much less imo. And they could then cope.

When I look at the curriculum I do despair. I don't know the answer but so much time allocated to so many things I wish they would not waste my sons time with. It's so unfit for purpose ATM .

Rhanks for all the supportive comments. To answer a few questions. Children are in y7 and y10. Reasonable adjustments include access to the nuture room, missing particular lessons and leavr 5 min early pass. While I appreciate all this from the school it is realltoo little too late. I'll be amazed if either are able to return to school.

Can I ask how you got the medical education team schooling. My older child is in total mental health crisis and I think this might be the only option for them - not sure how to access it though.

Might be worth checking if they’d allow the year 10 child to take their GCSE exams at the school, if you get them the right books to study at home. But please don’t panic, they can still do exams when they’re older and once they’re coping with life better. If you feel you need to Home Educate check out HEFA, Home Education for All on Facebook, all the legal bits are in the guides and loads of help if you take that path.

Sometimes it's hard to get very specific details on adjustments like this when you drill down with the school. For example, how often, when, who is supporting them, how often, which lessons etc.

I find that the accommodations are often very woolly, ad hoc and they may go a week never going to the nurture room for example. Then they kick off when they can't manage and suddenly get whisked to the nurture room. 🤷 Id guess there isn't a SEN plan wherein the very specific details of what, when, how should be spelled out specifically across each week. I don't think any secondary schools ever do this, they should. They just don't have the resources to organise and implement this so it's usually flying by the seat of their pants. That's really frustrating and difficult for these kids.

It's definitely worth applying for an EHCP here OP. You could consider college level provisions for your older child as part of this. There could be a lot out there that you aren't aware of.

I empathise. My eldest autistic DC struggled to attend from Y8. Lots of adjustments but she spent a significant proportion of Y8-10 sitting in the pastoral hub learning nothing. I would apply for an EHCP. I feel like it was faster to do this as a parent than via the school. We finally got one at the end of Y10 which allowed some online learning. After 9 months of this DC now wants to return to her school for sixth form - I never thought she would say that. Unfortunately she won't get the grades for the entry requirements due to all the previous missed learning 😔.

Younger DC now displaying lots of anxiety about attending. Would have thought the school would bend over backwards to be supportive given the situation with DC1 but no. I do feel a bit like they are judging me because I've had two DC in this position, but I'm a teacher myself - it's not like I don't value education!

Hi OP, I also have a year 10 child in mental health crisis and unable to attend school. I also feel like I'm a failure of a parent and I can't understand how we have got here - although their recent autism diagnosis does go a long way to explain things.
No advice or wisdom here, but I hear you and really I don't think either of us are failures.

Under section 19 of the Education Act 1996, the LA has a duty to ensure compulsory school aged DC unable to attend school full time still receive a suitable full-time education. This comes in many forms and different LAs call it different things, but it is alternative provision. On their website, IPSEA has a model letter you can use to request alternative provision. You can send it to the Director of Children’s Services at your LA.

I'm sorry to here this happened to you too. Really sad for me that my child has made it all through from y7-9 finding it hard but trying there best. Only to crash now it really counts in terms of getting gcses. I doubt she will be able to take them now or will do much worse than she would have expected.

Agree with the comment about having 2 children out of school makes you feel more judged. When it was just one I felt a lot more sure of the situation than now they are both not attending.

Sorry to hear you are in this situation. I have two autistic kids (8 and 10) 8year old dd isn’t attending at all at the moment despite a small
nurturing school and 10 year old DS does four mornings a week after an 8 month burnout. It’s hard going and I’ve no idea where to go from here for dd. I’m in Scotland so not ehcp. I feel like a failure too but we’re not we’ve tried our best we really have!

Yes, it's the same here in that DC1 started struggling in year 8, but only this year, with GCSEs imminent, ended up completely crashing out of school.

I do have a younger one who is attending, which I agree does feel like a bit of a "See! It's DC1 not me" get out of jail card. I can only imagine the levels of judgement (self judgement or otherwise) sky rocket with two out of school.

One thing that helped me wasdd’s disgnosis of autism. I realised she had been masking but once she got to 13/14, the ‘rules’ of society and interactions change so much and become more complex and she couldn’t cope with that. I alway assumed there was a level of knowledfe by a young person that they were masking, but I have since learned sometimes there is no consciousness about it, which is why a crash seems to appear out of the blue. I now realise this is my dd.