Finding a Special School

[Bitstuck1]

Hi,

Just wondering if anyone can recommend a Special School (Primary age) that would be good for an Autistic child (boy) with a very non compliant personality and strong demand avoidance, along the lines of PDA but that can't be diagnosed specifically.
We are in the North Newcastle, South Northumberland area, I have seen a good school from age 11 but struggling to find one for younger ages, where it says online it deals with demand avoidance/other behaviours that would be different from a more compliant child.
Its not for around another year but I like to research and get ideas well in advance. We could move an hour away from our current location if it came to it, rather than travel that far to a school everyday.
I would also consider a Private School if it is worth it and cheap enough :) to get the right school (I couldn't find much in Google), not really wanting to home school, but thinking I may have no choice in his younger years, I don't want him left without teaching at school because hes too difficult and avoiding learning.

Thank you if anyone has any suggestions :)

Independent schools can be funded via DS’s EHCP. I presume he has an EHCP? Mainstream independent is unlikely to offer a place with strong demand avoidance traits.

You don’t have to home educate. If it is inappropriate for provision to be made in a school, you can look at EOTAS/EOTIS.

Have you ruled out Rosewood? They do a lot 1:1.

Be aware if you move LA the new LA will review the EHCP and potentially amend or even propose to cease to maintain. You would have the right of appeal but it is a risk you need to be aware of.

Oh that would be great, he doesn't have an EHCP yet, but the LA went straight to assessing him with no holdups after I completed their form, we have quite a bit of evidence/assessments and will find out in 2 weeks if they will go ahead. I know its not easy to get one but we have 18 months so hopefully one is through by then as they didn't refuse us at first, so fingers crossed.
Thanks I hadn't even found Rosewood on my google searches, it looks good, now I feel that there is atleast one out there for the younger ages that would suit him. I have seen two for the older years but hadn't seen anything for Primary age suitable.

Thanks so much for that advice, I hadn't even thought about moving county would cause issues, we were just ready to move anywhere within a distance, cluelessly!!! So its moving nearer to a school if needed and staying as close to the LA border without crossing it :-) Great advice thanks.

You can search for schools here. There might be others you don’t know about.

If you get to the point where you need to consider EOTAS/EOTIS, there are alternative provisions that are worth looking at, e.g. Stomping Ground and Clarty Commandos (might be a bit too far depending on where you are).