School refusal - what next?

[unstablefeeling]

Had some great advice on here when my son wasn't able to go to school so thought I'd try again for advice with my daughter!

DD is 11 and is in year 7 at a large (12 form entry) secondary school. We only had a choice of 2 secondaries, and she chose this one. It's our nearest school, and she needs to get a bus from our village.

She has a long history of school avoidance at primary school, she has a SEN support plan for this, and has been waiting for a ND assessment from CAMHS for 2 years. Her brother (DS10) is autistic, possibly PDA, and after many struggles is now in a specialist SEMH school, which I have to drive him to because he is too anxious to use the taxi service.

DD found the transition to secondary quite hard and needed a lot of support to go in the building at first. I had a meeting with the Senco, they put in lots of support (forest school, nurture room pass, toilet pass, adapted timetable so she didn't need to go to the lessons she struggles most with, PE and dance). Her Attendance is 80 percent, although for February it's now 30 percent.

Over the weeks she's found it harder and harder to go in, days where she could manage the bus in got fewer and fewer, until I was driving her in most days and then she wouldn't get out of the car. There is one member of staff (year 7 pastoral lead) who is lovely and has always had success at coaxing her out of the car, but most of the other support staff don't know DD and so just say "come on" in an ineffective way and I have to resort to physically forcing her in once or twice. The nice member of staff now never seems to be available in the mornings.

This week, the SENCO came out while I was struggling to persuade her in, I asked for help and she said to me "it's not our responsibility to get your daughter into the building, we all have jobs to do". I got quite upset and said something along the lines of "it is your responsibility to help her cope in school, and if you can't, you should have applied for an EHCP for her" and she said "we need a years evidence for this". I know that's not true because of my experience with DS, but anyway she has 2 years worth of SEN plans from primary as evidence.

At this point I said to the SENCo that I needed to go as I was going to be late for work and I just got in the car, leaving my daughter in the car park. She Senco shouted at me "you can't just drive off, this is inappropriate! Inappropriate! Inappropriate!" In front of my daughter. But I really needed to go as I can't be late for work.

The next day, my husband drove my daughter in and was having similar struggles. Senco and deputy head came out and said to my husband "if she won't come in willingly, you have to take her home". My husband explained that we didn't want to do this as our experience with DS as well as DD in previous schools is that once they get the go ahead to stay at home, they will never go back. Anyway, he had to take her home and she hasn't been back this week. We've had a call to come in for a meeting because of the "incident" between me and the senco, which I know they are framing as me being in the wrong, but I don't understand why it's wrong for me to leave my child at school when most parents do that. They DO have a responsibility to get her in the building, surely? I mean, they must deal with much worse behaviour than this and not just send the kid home every day?
The absence where she was sent home has been listed as "unauthorised", but I have questioned this as don't think it's fair.

I just don't know what to do next. Any advice?

Appreciate this is hard for all parties.

So a possibly neurodiverse child, who has also been coping with having a ND PDA sibling, has struggled badly with transition to secondary, and school are saying they won't consider an EHCP for a Year?

If that's a fair summary:

-if DD can't cope with school, then you risk traumatising her by forcing her in. She sounds to be in a state of distress, presumably because the demands of the environment exceed her current abilities to cope. This suggests either the environment needs to be further adapated, or she needs a different environment, as her own development, whilst an important factor, is not likely to be the source of 'quick-wins', and it is not helpful when dealing with EBSA to put all of the focus on child factors. Your DC may need a CAMHS referral to get support with their distress.

Most important of all your child needs to know you recognise her distress, you'll keep her safe, and are in her corner.

It might be helpful to stop responding to this at the level of her 'behaviour' you are finding probematic, and start asking what's causing it, recognising this is likely to be an unresolved state of anxiety/distress. If this prevents a child from entering school, that should be coded I for illness. The LA has a responsibility to provide for educational needs in these circumstances and you should contact them (s19 provision).

Children do return to schools following EBSA, where the environment can be adjusted to meet their needs. Building confidence the setting is safe can take time and patience, and specialist support from an LA EP or CAMHS may be needed to develop a plan, and ensure everyone is supported.

You can apply for an EHCP. You can do it today using the template on the IPSEA website. You have evidence from her SEND plan and from her non-attendance.

Good luck to you and your DC, OP. It's not easy.

I wouldn’t physically force DD to attend. That is likely to cause more trauma.

The absences should be recorded as authorised. Email the school reminding them DfE’s attendance guidance states illness physical and mental health related) must be authorised. Add in that the regulations (Education (Pupil Registration) (England) Regulations 2006) make clear where a pupil is absent because they are unable to attend due to their medical needs the absence must be regarded as authorised.

Follow up the meeting (and any other verbal conversations) with an email so you have a paper trail as evidence.

Request an EHCNA yourself. In the meantime, DD can’t attend school the LA has a duty to ensure DD still receives a suitable full-time education. Contact the LA about this. IPSEA has a model letter for this too.

Thanks for these responses. I agree that I have been more focused on how DD's "behaviour" is impacting me and DH rather than how it's affecting her. I think we're all still traumatised by what we went through with DS, who spent a year out of school and is very challenging to live with, especially for my children, and so we haven't been able to give DD the support she really needs. We've just hoped she'll get on with it, but it's become clear that she can't.

The main problem with allowing DD to stay at home is that this runs the risk of DS going back to refusing. He is in an amazing setting who really understand him and he has made loads of progress, but he still has quite low attendance and really cannot handle it when his siblings have a day off but he doesn't. When he is at home all day he is very difficult to manage because he can't initiate activities very well (ie gets really angry and starts punching people), and I won't be able to cope with both of them at home together, plus I need to go out to work 2/3 days a week (no chance of WFH). DH is currently at home on gardening leave having been made redundant but he is looking for a new job, which may well not be WFH.

I do understand what you say about getting the LA to provide an alternative full time education, but my experience with DS was that this just didn't materialise, no matter what their obligations are. The primary school were very helpful in DS's case, they sent a TA round once a week with work (which he didn't do!) but I don't think this enormous secondary school will do the same. From what I can tell from talking to other parents, they have loads of kids who don't attend and they are just told there's nothing to school can do. It's only because I've been through this before that I know not to believe them!

On a practical note, DD's school is in a different LA to where we live, as we live on the county border, would I apply to our home LA or the school's LA? For the alternative education as well as for the EHCNA?

DD has been referred to CAMHS, we are waiting for a CBT course for anxiety, as well as for the ND assessment.

You request an EHCNA from the LA you live in. Same for provision under s.19 of the Education Act 1996. You can force the LA to provide provision, via JR if necessary. If the LA refuse to provide s.19 provision, or ignore you, you should threaten JR. Then, if that doesn’t work, you need a pre-action letter. The school sending work home does not discharge the LA’s duty, the LGO is clear on that.

Is DD known to the local young carers service?

How old is DS? On a day when both DD and DS are in school does DS leave first and who arrives home first? If DS leaves first and arrives home last, if DD knew there was no pressure to go to school, would she be able to not mention not going to school until after DS has left?

Yes DD and my other DS (7) are both known to young carers.

DS is 10. He leaves the house after DD and comes home before her. He also often doesn't leave the house on time as it can take a lot of persuasion to get him dressed. We have quite often managed to get him out of the house without realising she's still at home, (we are lucky in this that he's fairly oblivious to his surroundings!) and she has gone for a walk at the time that he's due back, so that she's not there when he gets home. But I don't think this is sustainable on a permanent basis, especially as DS2 leaves at the same time as DD and so will start to question why he never sees her leave anymore! Those two usually have breakfast together but we keep DS1 in his room until they've both left the house, to try to minimise the stress for everyone.

I've been in touch with DD's primary school to get all the information they hold on her, to use as evidence for a EHCNA application. I don't feel like I have the strength to go through all this again, it nearly broke us all. The endless ignoring from the LA, chasing emails, being told no all the time. And that was with a child with much more obvious needs. It's so draining and stressful.

This is very difficult.

It may be there is an interim setting(s) for DD which is more manageable for her, so this doesn't automatically mean her being at home.

I see the issues, but if she becomes badly traumatised, you will have a much bigger and longer term issue to try and recover from.

Having professionals advocating for you as a family, and seeing the situation holistically is going to be important. I know how impossibly stretched CAMHS are, but I'd ring and ensure they understand the full picture, including how DCs needs are impacting on each other.

In a sane universe someone with specialist knowledge would be placed on the case. Given we don't currently live in that universe, should funds permit, seeking recommendations for a child psychologist locally, with a view to seeing them privately for a few sessions, might be helpful? That would give you some immediate support with problem solving yourself, and possibly provide some more insights and coping strategies?

Is there any personal support for yourself, perhaps via workplace OH, if there is any? This sounds enormously stressful.

this doesn't automatically mean her being at home.

This. What alternative provision settings do you have within travelling distance? Would any be suitable for DD?

Have you had social care assessments? A carer’s assessment for you and an assessment via the disabled children’s team for DS.

Thank you so much for your responses. It's so helpful.
We have had a number of social care assessments over the years, DS doesn't meet the threshold for the disabled children's team, unfortunately. We just keep being referred to Family Support. Recently had Family Support stopped after a few weeks, because DS2's school complained to Social Services that the support worker was useless! She was, to be fair! So our case went back to SS and they just tell us there's nothing they can do. I haven't had a carer's assessment I don't think. Would DS need to be with disability for that? He does get DLA, and I did get carers allowance when I wasn't working (when he was off school full time).
It's always been child protection SS I think. We were placed on Child in Need plan a few years ago when DS wasn't going to school, but the social worker came round once and said there was nothing she could do for us and closed our case.

I don't know about alternative provisions that would be suitable for DS. When I was looking for my son, I found a few forest school type things that he couldn't cope with but DD might enjoy. There's a horse based thing nearby too. She does actually really enjoy learning and loves her lessons. She tries really hard with all the academic subjects, and art and music, plays the piano. So I wouldn't want her to miss out on all this. I feel like she could thrive academically in the right environment.

I will look into finding a child psychologist, thanks for that idea.

Social care is fobbing you off. They can provide greater support. DS definitely does meet the threshold for the CwD social care team. Have you complained? If you ever appeal the EHCP you can request social care provision is looked at too. DS doesn’t need to be under the CwD team for a carer’s assessment. On their website, Contact has a model letter you can use.

Whilst you go through the EHCP process for a longer term solution, if you get s.19 provision that doesn’t have to be at home even if it is academic tuition. It could take place in a library, other council building, church hall. The LA’s may have a unit or centre they use.