Current school and new schools contacting each other

[drspouse]

I have posted in SEN about this but this is a bit more of a general issue.

Our DS is in Y2 and his current school are saying they can't meet his needs. We're just waiting for the outcome of the EHCP panel but we are sure they are going to approve 1:1 (he currently has this) and then it's a case of what else we think he needs that we may need to appeal for.

Current school are pushing us to look at special schools so they can get rid. We think he could manage a smaller mainstream school (currently things like playground noise, noisy classrooms next to each other etc. are a struggle for him).

We rang one smaller mainstream school that was recommended to us by a carer who knows the local schools. Instead of ringing us back, the other school rang his current school (and didn't ring us back).

We are not sure if we can do anything about this. We wanted to contact smaller mainstream schools once we have his EHCP confirmed. But what can we do to prevent his current school from talking to them (and them from talking to his current school)?

Do we HAVE to tell other schools where he is currently? Are they allowed to talk to other schools about him?

Well why ask for advice then?
I didn't. I said we wanted to look at small schools. Everyone else, who's never my DS, is telling me he won't suit a mainstream school, that small schools are no good etc etc.
I'm taking advice from local friends and professionals who know my DS and the schools.
The only advice I wanted was on the legality of his current school releasing our information.
Seems opinion is divided on that, though.

Have you asked the school what information the potential new school asked for, and what information they gave? Also, it would be worth asking who rang - was it the head, the SENCo, the receptionist asking for admin reasons?

Have you spoken to the potential new school since? I know they didn't ring you back at the time of the conversation with the current school, but how many times have you tried to contact them since, and have you ever succeeded in talking to anyone? There may be a completely innocent explanation for the silence - sickness, absence, holiday (when did you contact them?) busy-ness, things simply dropping lower down a pile of 'to do' in the face of other urgent items?

I know if you feel the current school is 'rejecting' your child, you can see that rejection everywhere, but the mental link 'They want to get rid of my child so they put off a prospective alternative school' doesn't make sense, and the link 'We think he would benefit from SS so we will work to prevent him moving to another mainstream school' is at best far-fetched - what do they gain from it?

Nobody has told you your ds "won't suit a mainstream school, that small schools are no good etc etc."

People have suggested that you might be advised to listen to the people who see your ds in school every day. People have also suggested that small schools come with their own issues (useful information if it was something you didn't know). People have told you about their own experiences. People have questioned why you are holding on to the word of one psychiatrist who doesn't seem to have taken on board any information from other professionals. In my authority, a diagnosis is, or isn't given after a multi-disciplinary assessment , after evidence is collected from all places that the child spends time, because people can respond very differently in different situations.

We know you asked about whether a school could talk to another school about your child without your express permission, but what everybody is telling you is that this just isn't the hill to die on. You are probably right that technically, the school shouldn't have rung at this stage in the process without your permission but, your child couldn't access a place without the new school hearing all the information about him, and it really is about the order of things. This isn't what you should be getting so angry about.

You're right, cant we have given them a few weeks but it would be worth calling back.
Current school is very much "we know best" and when the specialist teacher came the feeling was "we can't really learn anything she has to say" but it turned out that there were things they hadn't tried.

Honestly, if you only rang them once and haven't chased it since, it is much more likely to be oversight than anything else. Did you ring before or after the Easter break?

Having seen the 'how many plates can I keep spinning??' performance of most primary administrators / receptionists / office managers / whoever mans the phones - and indeed most school staff, most of the time - it is genuinely quite possible that the failure to ring back has no malice or meaning intended at all.

The current school told us they'd spoken to the other school and "while it's your right to seek the right school for DS we don't think that's a mainstream school".
So while we don't know for sure what they told the other school, that sounds fairly clear that's what they will tell other schools.
I asked this question to find out if this was going to happen every time we went off message and asked to see a mainstream school.
But we do need to hear this from the other school.

You have a child with SEN any potential school is going to talk to the current school to get a good overview as no one is going to want a failed placement.

The school can only give accurate information as it would all be quantified by the reports from the experts.

Could you look for a mainstream school that has a special school within the grounds.

Your friends are not educationalists and they haven’t spent the last 3 years trying to teach your son the curriculum.

I’m not telling you not look at small schools I’m telling you to be very careful not to fall into the trap that small schools are the answer because in my experience which is extensive they’re not!!

*Your friends are not educationalists"
Some of them are. Some of the people giving advice are non-teaching professionals in SEN.

Ok, I've read this full thread and don't understand half of the acronyms and I've also read your OP in the other thread you linked.

The thing that stands out to me through all the grand-standing and anger is this - just one sentence.

"He has ADHD and is impulsive and not learning because he can't pay attention."

You've mentioned the school has noticed no improvement despite his new meds. He also has a 1:1 assistant I'm presuming?

I know you think a smaller school will be better for him. But you appear to be overlooking this one simple fact. That fact is not going to change whether you put him in Eton or a Special School.

You're already paying for a private psychiatrist. Can you highlight the core issue as you see it to the psychiatrist again and see what he/she says?

All the issues at school started before he was on meds.
He has only been on a working dose for 3 weeks. We still think it's a bit low and we are going to see about increasing it.
He's had 3 years of not getting stuff in class.

And what do you think a different mainstream school might be able to accomplish that his current school is failing at?

You've mentioned noise. Children are noisy buggers - be that 2 of them or 30. A smaller school is still going to be noisy.

I have no idea whether this is a daft idea - not even sure if such a thing is possible (!), but would there be a possibility for him to have music playing (I'm think hotel foyer type - but maybe metal could do the trick also) at a low volume in airbuds work for him in cancelling out the excessive noise and also enable him to hear his teacher and assistant and classmates? Maybe they could adjust the volume for play time so it drowned out louder noises?

You also say that he is capable of a lot more at home than he is achieving at school. Can I ask what is different about those two settings? Is there any suggestion you can come up with for the assistant to mirror how you work with him?

Just rambling - not my area of expertise at all.

I think you missed my point. My point was that the meds haven't changed the fact that he can't pay attention as you call it.

How old is your son?

And can I just say that I think you're a great Mum - you're fighting for what you think is best for him.

Does he get invited to parties/play-dates any of that stuff?

How is he with his siblings?

Also - final question (I think!) - now that he has the ADHD diagnosis and is being treated - are you considering getting him tested for ASD?

I haven't read through the whole thread, sorry, but have you contacted the person in your LA who has responsibility for LAC or former LAC children? They are the person to get on side. COntact your local sit horrify and ask to speak to them, they are usually called Head of Virtual School.

the meds haven't changed the fact that he can't pay attention as you call it.
Well this is pretty much the defining feature of ADHD, isn't it?
He's behind because he can't pay attention.
He needs to a) be able to pay attention (not happened yet) and b) catch up. 3 weeks is not enough to do that!

And no, if he doesn't have enough symptoms to get an ASD diagnosis, what would be the point. Should every child who's behind academically be assessed for ASD?

He does get invited to parties, and everyone came to his.
He says he has no friends though, we've had a couple of playdates at my instigation, they've gone OK. He plays well if it's a running around game/the park, but struggles to start games. School told me he can't make conversation because he has babyish interests (e.g. our cat rather than football and Xbox).
The current school ^specifically° say he needs a smaller school. The ones we are looking at are the ones that professionals have said or friends have said have dealt well with similar children.

Hi OP, a few (many) name-changes ago, I remember when your DS was much smaller. I'm sorry to hear that school is causing so much stress now. It must be hugely frustrating, and I know it takes masses of energy to keep other people's focus on just accessing a fair education for your child, in a setting where he is supported to focus and show his potential. I am often muttering that life would be easy without school (well, maybe not quite "easy", but they're certainly a source of a significant proportion of our problems).

Can you leverage any advice/support from the virtual school or has that proved a dead end already? This is a long lonely road and I'm just trying to think of how it could be less isolated. Permanence support are relatively good here, and the LAC paediatrician has also helped "re-direct" school for us on occasion.

The LA might be in a position to give a definitive answer about information-sharing and consent. My own (business, not education) awareness of GDPR leads me to think they might be claiming the legal basis of "legitimate interest" but for this you need to show it's impossible to perform that function without storing/sharing the information, or that there is reasonable evidence the individual gave the information for that purpose. This seems a bit shaky to me in your case as you've been asked for separate consent in other circumstances.

Wishing you all the best

So would you say it's his behaviour or his learning that his current school takes issue with?

Can you test IQ at a young age?

Could it be that he is actually performing to the best of his ability?

Not sure if your username is indicative of your DH's profession - but if you're both high achievers, maybe you need to lower the bar a little for this young lad!

Schools have to communicate with each other. It's standard

They say "he's not learning" but it's really his behaviour (noise, running around, talking all the time etc. - so classic ADHD).
Other children in the same school who are way more behind are not a problem because they are quiet.
I'm a bit more pushy at home, I think, but also I am quite forensic if that makes sense? Science background so I kind of test him, read up on how phonics works, that kind of thing. Then I tell school he hasn't grasped XYZ and they say "oh that's not how we do it' or whatever. I had a whole thread about them writing "good guessing" in his diary. Then just now in his EHCP they complained he guesses.
IQ tests - he was assessed by the EP - he could be around 100 or he could be around 75. She couldn't tell!

I don't think he's suddenly stopped being able to learn entirely. He was happily keeping up, asking complex science questions, loving to learn new words, in R/Y1. I don't think he's a high achiever but he's not doing what he's capable of either.

Perhaps start a thread giving a shout out to other parents of ADHD children to see how they're navigating the school system?

From how you perceive things, the ADHD is the main issue.

Maybe other parents with similar diagnoses can share how their schools deal with them?

We do have a couple of ongoing ADHD threads in fact.