School are revoking my autistic son's five minute early pass and he's full of anxiety. Please help.

[Sweetchildofmine123]

Hi,

I'm looking for some advice please.

My son is 13, and autistic.
He's a very young 13, not anywhere near the same maturity as most of his peers.

My son's school are taking away all five minute early passes to all children who have them, and replacing with five minute LATE passes.
This has had a huge impact on my son, he's not coping at all.

He used to be able to leave lessons and school five minutes early to avoid crowded corridors, and the crowds at the beginning and end of each day, and it's the only thing school have ever offered that's actually helped him.

They've replaced this with a five minute late pass.
Which means he has to wait behind in lessons, potentially leading him to be late to the next lesson.
Furthermore, and more crucially, they've taken away the leave early pass, so now he leaves school in the crush along with 1,900 other children.

It isn't working for him, he's in a high state of anxiety and is not sleeping well.

I've begged school to keep the early pass for him, as all children are different, and what works for one child may not work for another, autistic or not.
They point black refuse this.
So he's lost the one and only aid that really helped him.

I've contacted CAMHS, WMIM, and SENDIASS, asking for urgent intervention, but nothing is fast as they've all overloaded with work.

So I've requested a slight adjustment to his timetable with the school's SENDCo, and I don't think it's unreasonable.

I've asked if he can get in to school early (which he already does) and to be able to leave at the end of the school day five minutes early to avoid the crowds, which he cannot cope with.

After speaking with my son, I've agreed to the five minute late during transition between lessons, but I've asked school for this one little adjustment at the end of the school to help my son.

He masks at school, so they don't see his meltdowns, he saves them for when he's home.
They have no idea how badly he suffers, though I've tried to tell them.

Am I being unreasonable in asking for this small adjustment to help my son's mental health?
I'm not asking for a reduced timetable, just for him to be able to leave before the crowds start.

So far, school have failed to reply.
Also, when I spoke to the SENDCo yesterday, who has never even met my son, she suggested some ridiculous ideas, and she was having none of him keeping his early pass.
She even mentioned him leaving mainstream school, when there's no need for this - he is a perfect student who gets good grades and never causes any trouble.
That's really upset me - Can they push him out even though he's a model student?

And by law, can I ask for this tiny amendment to his timetable to help him with his anxiety please?

Sorry to waffle on, I didn't want to drip feed.

Thanks in advance for any advice you can give me, as waiting for replies is a nightmare, and I need this sorting before the new school year starts in September.

Thanks so much.

It is a minor adjustment in the grand scheme of what SEP is.

Ultimately, it would be the courts who decided if it is a reasonable adjustment. They are highly unlikely to rule it isn’t.

OP hasn’t said if it is the case or not, but if the provision is in an EHCP, it must be provided regardless of what they do for other DC.

Leaving late doesn’t work for all DC.

Some people can’t use public transport because of their additional needs.

For some children, there is no getting used to crowds.

At the end of the day, a general provision of education has to be designed for the general case. Adjustments have to be reasonable and the general school OPs child attends have decided that this one wasn't. What about the other kids?

A fifth of children are now categorised as needing SEND support now. This is absurd and unsustainable – clearly a fifth of the general population is not disabled.

You do realise the alternative they want is for mainstreams to be more inclusive? By doing things like making a reasonable adjustment for a 5 min early pass as an example.

Mainstream schools refusing RAs are one of the reasons why EHCPs and the need for specialist is increasing so much.

That is not the experience of my daughter who leaves her classes early. The first ten minutes are most useful to her. And don’t get me started on her missing registration. The number of texts I get saying she hasn’t registered is phenomenal, and that’s with her having an early pass.

She doesn’t get to her next class 5 minutes early, she gets there (mostly)at about the same time as other students start to arrive. This is far less of an issue for her than bing sat in the class as other students arrive.

“At the end of the day, disabled kids can just fuck off if they think they can have a good education, then we will bitch and moan about them when they become disabled adults who have to rely on the state for support, and we’ll take that away from them as well” 🤦🏻‍♀️

I suspect the problem is partly that the rest of the student body see it as a reward they aren't allowed that he's allowed to leave early every day. It presumably also means he can be early to the lunch queue early to every lesson getting to choose what seat he likes every time.
If the issue is dealing with crowds I don't see why leaving late is any worse than leaving early. Either option allows him to avoid crowds and it clearly is not a punishment as he's been given a pass to allow him to do it.

Oh, and nearly 25% of the U.K. population is disabled.

clearly a fifth of the general population is not disabled.

According to a government research briefing last year “an estimated 16.1 million people in the UK had a disability in 2022/23, accounting for 24% of the total population.”

Of course, not all will require leaving 5 mins early as SEP/a RA.

Does he have a formal diagnosis?

Does he have an EHCP?

I would put in writing your request for a reasonable adjustment to leave 5 minutes early. Keep it simple. Keep it factual. Ask them in writing if they are refusing this reasonable adjustment which you have requested under the disability act.

Meeting with GP to ask if this is a reasonable adjustment and ask them to write a letter on his behalf.

If it’s not a punishment because he is given a pass for it, it’s not a reward if he’s given a pass for it. Seems like a perfectly good example to set to young people that some others need to do things a little bit differently.

If a third of children have passes, I can see how it must be chaotic to manage them all.

I think that leaving five minutes after everyone else at the end of the day should be very much better than leaving earlier, to be honest. It's much calmer that way. I think he's being somewhat demanding in refusing that. If it's genuinely an issue for him to be in a crowd, then this addresses it. He really can't expect to have every single thing that he wants. His need is being addressed at the end of the day. His want, can't be.
Presumably he doesn't have to be supervised. He just gets to hang around until the others are out of the way.

One problem is that secondary state schools are so big. It is so much easier catering for reasonable adjustments in smaller schools where the teachers know all the children really well and it can all be a bit more relaxed. I can see why the leaving early is an issue if 1/3 of children have these passes but so would arriving late to lessons. You basically can’t start the lesson til everyone is there so there must be a load of teenagers mucking about at the beginning of each lesson.

So melodramatic. Of course disabled children should have access to education. The question is how this can realistically be accommodated when every other child is now classed as needing SEND support, and the definition of disabled is more and more nebulous so as to be basically meaningless.

A friend of mine ticks that they are disabled on job applications in order to guarantee themselves an interview, and is open about the fact that they don't really consider themselves disabled. They have some floaters in their vision... clearly this is tangibly different to someone who needs a wheelchair. But both are categorised as disabled. Come on. We have a problem here, even if it's awkward to talk about

My mistake.

You've made my point for me. Unless you include "getting old", clearly almost a quarter of UK society is not disabled. Look outside! Absurd

That is very much not OP or her son's problem. A lot of people are keen to say that her son must learn to adapt now so that he's prepared for adult life. The other students also need to learn and adapt that sometimes other people need things you don't as that's a skill they'll need in adult life.

Every other child in mainstream secondary schools does not have SEN. In state funded secondary schools, 3.1% have EHCPs and a further 13.4% recorded as receiving SEN Support, so 16.5% in total. Some schools will have more and some less, but every other child is not classed as needing SEN Support.

Not all disabilities are visible.

They say.

But in practice, what this will mean and, what the Government are fully aware of and motivated by, is that fashionable and ballooning diagnoses such as ADHD will become less prevalent once the legal entitlements of EHCPs are removed (except for those with the most complex needs). If a fifth of students get extra time in exams and your child doesn't, the incentive is there to get your child one too.

The other 34% are on the waiting list.

Do you know how the govt could cut ehcps?

By forcing schools to give children tiny little reasonable adjustments that cost next to nothing. Op might be forced into getting an ehcp for her son just to be allowed to carry on doing something that's worked already and school have taken away for no reason. He doesn't need an ehcp, but due to the senco digging her heels in for no reason, he's now needs an ehcp. That's not his fault. There's no way to force a school to accommodate a child without an ehcp they just ignore you. They wait you out until you deregister.

My son needs an ehcp because his school point blank refuse to accommodate his disability in any way. Initially he needed a little bit of support in the mornings from a trusted person. That was working well, they took it away, his school attendance has completely collapsed as a result and now he's waiting for an ehcp he doesn't actually need but it's the only way he can get any kind of help at all.

I don't think until you've lived through the absolute bloody minded stupidity of some sencos and teachers, you really don't get it.

EHCPs and SEN Support are not based on diagnosis. They are based on needs. You don’t need a diagnosis to have an EHCP or be classed as with SEN Support.

i saw your edited post. Why are you so offended by me referring to me and my family as being ND?

Yes but reasonable adjustments doesn’t equal ‘anything the person demands’. The issue is to avoid crowds. Leaving late resolves this issue. The schools have to factor in everything and everyone wise in their structuring. Just like workplaces, reasonable adjustments doesn’t mean ‘whatever you demand’.

Yes but class wide distraction causing the entire class to miss the last 5 mins whilst a proportion of the class pack up and leave is not something that anyone needs to learn to adapt to. Not even there is a compromise solution of leaving 5 min late.

Legally they are obligated to put in a reasonable adjustment under the equality act. I would email the governes, cc the sendco and headteacher and inform them as you have here the effect it is having on your son, how they have taken away his reasonable adjustment which is disability discrimination and you will now be seeking legal advice on disability discrimination.