What school to put down on EHCP? (Year 5 entry)

[WhichSchooltoDecide]

Year 5 entry due to 3 tier system in my town, in September 2024. DC has an EHCP so any of the schools can be forced to take them:

All ofsted reports are good. Current school thinks any would be fine.

School A – 0.8m from home – staff were extremely rude to me when I looked round, extremely strict on uniform (as in Blazers, shirts and long trousers from Year 5 and no summer uniform), layout of the school would suit DCs conditions though, DC could walk to it alone as the work is very safe. This is DCs preferred choice due to wanting to be away from current classmates. No-one from their school let alone their class will go here.

School B – 0.9m from home, Catchment school - Has completely ignored any emails or phonecalls I or the council have made to them so I have no idea whether the layout would suit as I’ve not seen it. According to the website Years 5 and 6 can either wear a blazer and shirt or a jumper and shirt and tie so a bit more relaxed than school A. DC could walk half way once I’d got them passed the big dual carriage way. This is councils preferred choice. I want to rule it out as they've ignored all attempts at contact but council say it's still on the table as a choice and I can veto it according to the council (apparently because we're looking at MS not Special there's more choice)

School C – 11 miles from home, next town over and a Primary not a Middle School – I think this is the best option for DC, but DC is not keen, it’s a typical primary school with outdoor space and very self contained so I think that’d be better than different classes in different places of the Middle Schools. Council have said if I go for this one I’d have to get DC there myself, and being so far away might limit friendships a bit.

School D – 12 miles from home, next town over but different town to school C and is a Middle School again – Nice enough, layout would work but far away in terms of physically getting DC there. Again I'd be responsible for getting DC there.

I think I’ve ruled out School D, but have included it just in case and to show I’ve seen a lot of schools, I’ve seen 10 schools and spoken to around 15 to rule them out.

Any thoughts on which school would suit?

It only has to suit until Year 6 as we have a school in mind for Secondary (not a special school, but a resource base MS secondary). Apart from school C I'm not particularly impressed with any of the options available and think it'll be a case of picking the best of the worst if that makes sense.

Agree, but if the resource base is filled and due to space etc, can't accept another pupil, they will give a legitimate reason (this is the problem with SEN funding and not being national strategy, those at the edges of LA areas can be disadvantaged or small LA's). No resource base will go with carrying a space unless it has to due to funding, but given numbers of pupils requiring/waiting for placement this is not normally an issue, they often can be filled multiple times over).

On its on being full is not enough of a reason to refuse admission. The child’s LA has to prove the school is so full admitting DC is incompatible. Obviously there is a point where they can do this but the bar is far higher than many LAs care to admit. It is more than an “adverse effect”, “impact on” or “prejudicial to”. Although many LAs ignore this and force parents to appeal. Many, many appeals where LAs claim there is no space are upheld.

The aim of the Resource Base is basically by Year 11/GCSEs they spend more time in the MS classes with support than in the RB, but obviously they spend around 60-70% depending on the child in the RB in the earlier years. So there could well be space because a Y11 pupil is only accessing the place 10-20% of the time.

Hello OP! I work in a middle school in Bedfordshire and have been SENDCo. Our areas are moving to two tier so we only have another few years of taking on Year 5s before it becomes reception and Year 7 intakes.

Benefits of a middle school are the specialist teachers and facilities. For example at our school we have science labs with a very well stocked tech room of equipment for practicals, a big sports hall, changing rooms, field and AstroTurf, cooking room, music room, art room, textiles room, woodwork room and so on. Typically, primary schools don't have these facilities or specialist teachers so in Year 7 it's new and exciting to go to secondary school for these experiences.

However, the downside is pupils tend to move around a lot more. There is a lot of lesson transition like in secondary and the timetable isn't flexible like in primary. Pupils will go to different rooms, with different pupils and different teachers so for ASD children this can be very daunting as there is no standard "safe space" that they'd get from their normal primary classroom and regular class teacher. However, it's a smaller environment to get used to all these transitions than at secondary.

Only you know your child but maybe consider these points when picking whether primary or middle would be best.

@WhatHappenedToYoyos Thank you, not ASD but DC does have a mobility issue which means we have to think about layout and where things are in relation to where DC will be lots to think about.

Even if an RB pupil is in mainstream 100% of the time, they still take up an RB space.

The RB can't backfill the space of a child who goes into mainstream. Their support package just shifts to the mainstream setting and their spot in the RB remains open for them in case anything goes wrong with mainstream integration and they need to be in the base for more time again.

@2reefsin30knots Thank you you make a very good point, I know the RB placement is not guarenteed.