Help - EHCP Mediation / Appeal

[Jellybean023]

Hi,

DD is 6yo and diagnosed (privately) with ADHD and ASD. She's at an independent school (even before she was diagnosed we felt she’d benefit from the smaller class sizes, variety of activities, and additional stretch as we always felt she was very bright). Anyway she’s had a very challenging first two years at school, in particular with emotional regulation / behaviour but also is struggling in some aspects of the academic side despite being very bright. She’s now medicated which has improved things but still frequent issues and incidents.

Her paediatrician suggested she would need an EHCP so the school initiated the process with our support. It was rejected before even getting to the assessment stage! We spoke to the caseworker who recommended appealing however I’m really unclear what next steps are etc. We have emailed the case worker to say we want to appeal but heard nothing back and have contacted Global Mediation who have opened a case and are supposedly going to set up a meeting between us and the LA.

The problem is DDs school breaks up for summer next week and we have a deadline of two months from the LA letter (which was received mid-May) or one month from receipt of a mediation certificate to lodge an appeal. What happens if the meeting isn’t set up before the summer break (quite likely) and we can’t even get to the mediation stage before the two months is up? Are we ok as we’ve initiated the process?

More broadly what do we expect from here. We know it’s going to be a hard slog and it’s very difficult to get anything due to funding issues etc, but what does the process look like and at what stage might we need legal support etc. The school SENCO has been fantastic but doesn’t have a lot of experience of applying for EHCPs and I want to make sure we do the best by our daughter to get her the help she needs.

Any advice welcomed!

Mediation should take place within 30 days of your request. That doesn’t always happen. When it doesn’t, global mediation should issue a mediation certificate anyway. However, you can still partake in mediation later if you want.

It doesn’t matter if mediation happens after 2 months from the date of the decision letter.

If your deadline to submit an appeal falls in August, you have until the first working day in September, whichever is later.

Schools don’t always attend mediation. Although if they do, they sometimes still do this even if it is held during the holidays.

You don’t have to partake in mediation. You only have to consider it. You don’t have to actively partake. You can tell Global Mediation you just want the mediation certificate. Then submit to SENDIST.

Paying for legal representation isn’t essential, especially for a refusal to assess. You should start to think about your evidence and if you need independent assessments. Also, submit SARs, but if you are going to mediation, I would wait until after this to capture anything surrounding that. Once you have a mediation certificate, you can submit to SENDIST. Your appeal will then be registered. The LA will then respond to the appeal. Assuming the LA oppose it, the appeal then ticks along with dates for things like the final evidence deadline along the way. The vast majority of refusal to assess appeals are heard on the papers.

@perpetualplatespinning thank you very much. So just to clarify, our two month deadline is mid-July, so are we are still ok even if the mediation meeting hasn’t happened before then. So let’s say the mediation meeting gets set up for end July and mediation certificate then issued, do we have till end August to lodge the appeal without missing any deadlines?

Yes, it is OK if mediation doesn’t happen before the 2 months deadline.

If your deadline falls at the end of August, you have until the first working day in September to submit to SENDIST.