AIBU to be shocked school charging to fill in dyslexia questionnaire?

[Thematic]

My son attends a state junior school. He is in year 3. We have had concerns about his reading and that he may be dyslexic for a while and have raised them with the school. We have been told the waiting list for any sort of assessment with in the school is long and that a private assessment would be better. The assessor has asked the school to complete a questionnaire. The school have told us their policy is for charge £50 to do this, and they will also charge for any meeting to discuss the outcome etc as they say that teachers have to do it in their own time. I'm absolutely horrified. This seems discriminatory to the max - we are fortunate to be able to afford this assessment but it's only being done privately because we felt we were left with no other option. I would like to fight it as I feel it is a disability discrimination issue. I being unreasonable?

Is it an accademy? Ask to see their charging policy. Would not expect to be charged for them to provide concise information on my child. I would be furious, particularly as they have said there is a wait.

No, it's a LA community school. They have told me the governors agreed to the policy last year.

Ask to see their charging policy - they must have one and it be available. I can't see anything that excludes it, but equally not sure anyone would have thought necessary to exclude. You can make an application to assess for an ehcp, ad make it clear in your application you are doing it this route, due to the charging policy of the school. The school then has to provide the LA with information which you can then access.

Thanks @Takeachance18. Unfortunately we needed the questionnaire filling out quickly as we have secured a cancellation spot for an assessment this Saturday so I don't think we'd have time to go with the EHCP route - I've already paid them as I just needed it done. But I am completely horrified and would like to make a fuss about it, as I feel its discriminatory so I'm really trying to find out if I have a leg to stand on. They make it sound like having a SEN statement produced for your child is some sort of luxury item!

I've seen the charging policy. I was told by email that "The writing of reports for private school applications, private educational assessments and meetings related to these have to be carried out in a teacher's own time, out of school hours and do incur a fee. The Governors recently reviewed our charging and remission policy and we work from the policy which was compiled by the Finance Committee and approved by the Governors."

The charging policy only says the following:

Additional Charges
* School reserves the right to charge an administration fee for the following: Private educational assessment report and/or associated meetings with members of staff £50 per pupil, per report/hour

www.gov.uk/government/publications/charging-for-school-activities isn't clear.

The code of practice g102j, makes no reference to allowing charges, and they should be assessing etc,

In identifying a child as needing SEN support the class or subject teacher, working with the SENCO, should carry out a clear analysis of the pupil’s needs. This should draw on the teacher’s assessment and experience of the pupil, their previous progress and attainment, as well as information from the school’s core approach to pupil progress, attainment, and behaviour. It should also draw on other subject teachers’ assessments where relevant, the individual’s development in comparison to their peers and national data, the views and experience of parents, the pupil’s own views and, if relevant, advice from external support services. Schools should take seriously any concerns raised by a parent. These should be recorded and compared to the setting’s own assessment and information on how the pupil is developing.

I would write back and remind them of their duty, under Section 66 of the Children and Families Act 2014, to make their best endeavours to secure SEP to meet the pupil’s SEN.

Charging to complete private reports is one thing (although I think that is abhorrent too), but how they can comply with the law whilst charging for meetings to implement any recommendations as a result of a private assessment I don’t know.

Thanks @Imitatingdory 👍 I'll try that once we get the report.

That is shocking behaviour from the school thematic, although sadly not surprising. Good luck in challenging it.

I was once charged for support in school for Ds. When I challenged the Senco, she said the support that Ds was receiving in school for his MH, was not for them to provide and likened it to parents paying for peripatetic music lessons. I was shocked she could even look at the two things in the same way.

That's appalling. I do these all the time - its my job! Bet the staff member isn't getting the £50 for the form they are filling in in their own time. Given that as a teacher we do huge amounts of work in our own time - what's next? Charging for parents evenings.

Problem now is I'm afraid to complain about it as I need schools support and if I rock the boat they may be less helpful.

Sadly it often doesn’t work that way. Children whose parents can advocate for their child and hold the school and LA to account get better support, it shouldn’t be that way, but it is. Sometimes you have to be that parent and a child with SEN is one of those times.

Oh happy to advocate @Imitatingdory, just want to pick my battles carefully. Don't want to get the hackles up over something like this when there are bigger battles to potentially fight. I'd rather not be seen as the highly strung, troublemaker parent if I really do need their help further down the line.

They are breaking the law. They know this. If you push back on the charge they will know you know this. It's not necessarily a bad outcome. See it as practice for any future occasion when you may need to apprise the local authority that THEY are breaking the law.

You will help other parents too.

@Phineyj can you give me details of the law they're breaking? I can't find any rules that say they're doing anything wrong, though to me it seems ethically wrong, and I don't want to fight it without some solid facts.

No, but if it were legal for a state school to do this they'd all be at it! Why don't you look on the websites of the dyslexia charities for advice? I am sorry, my DC has a different type of SEN so I only know detail f assessments for that.

I wouldn't have paid the charge for completing the questionnaire, just sent the assessor the most recent school reports and if poss examples of his schoolwork. The assessor will reach their own conclusion anyway, on the evidence of the assessment. But I can somewhat see the school's perspective too, if they genuinely believe there's no issue and parents are wasting everyone's time going against advice. (Though it seems to me more like a way to disincentivise parents from obtaining proper assessments...)

I absolutely would refuse to pay for a discussion with teacher and SENDCO about meeting my child's needs and making reasonable adjustments for his disability, following a diagnosis. that. The source of the diagnosis isn't relevant, at that point it's about digesting the info and recommendations and meeting the needs. Contact your local SENDIASS for advice.

I think there's something in that @Ceara as the school report says he'd meeting expectations, but the outcome of the assessment was that he has an exceptionally high IQ and in tests other than to do with reading, he's operating at a very high level but that his phonetic skills are at very low end of average. So I guess the school has never really twigged how clever he is, but at the same time, from there perspective he's getting by and they therefore have other kids to worry about. But we have a solid diagnosis of dyslexia now and it's done his self esteem no end of good to find out he's got reasons to find reading difficult and that he's not stupid or slow.

@thematic snap, my year 3 is the same and school also missed him. My DS was privately assessed and diagnosed at the end of year 2, and the impact of the self-knowledge that he's dyslexic not stupid has just been transformational. So glad you and your DS have answers and he's finding the diagnosis helpful for his self esteem too. Good luck with the conversations with school!

Thanks @Ceara, glad it worked out for you too. The school have been better since we had the assessment report and haven't tried to charge me to see the SENCO. My suspicion is that because we're in a cripplingly middle class area, they are probably swamped by parents wanting to know why their kids aren't as successful as they'd hoped, so maybe they get tons of these requests and just don't have the resources to manage it all.

That's ridiculous. I've never heard of that and I do private assessments and always get school advice.

That's outrageous! It's part of your job under the teachers' standards...

Part of the teachers job I should say.

The school needs to define 'educational assessment'. This is generally used to mean reports for applications to other educational establishments or 'gifted' type programmes. It should not be used for SEND assessments. I would use the school complaints procedure to highlight the difference and point them at the SEND code of conduct.