Statement-advice please eveyone

[chatee]

had a meeting today with a local education officer regarding dd's statement and would like to know the views of the expert mumsnetters....
basically it is dd's pre-school year and she will be attending five mornings between 9-11.30 am and i will pay extra on 2 days for her to attend the lunchtime club until 12.45pm.
my dd has cerebral palsy and can not stand unaided and walks around with the use of a kaye walker.dd can not go to the toilet unaided as she can't balance to remove clothing or get herself on the toilet etc.
The last term dd attended for 7 hours and received support from a support worker for the 5 hours she attended the pre-school but nothing for the lunch time club(that was not a problem as there were only 10 children at the lunch time club and 2 members of staff)
well the offer this term is:
1.7 hours from a support worker for the 12.5 hours she is at pre-school
2. supervision from a mid day assistant for the lunch time club

have discussed my concerns this morning but the education officer is adamant this is enough cover and has suggested an interim review in December to see how things are going
do i agree with this? well no i am still worried she will just be left to do things she can do or she will become frustrated when help isn't around quick enough to enable her to keep up with her playmates.On 3 mornings there will be 2 members of staff and 10 children, on the other 2 mornings(when the playschool children also attend)there will be 3 staff and 20 children.the staff ratios do not include the support worker for dd
please if you have any opinions/knowledge help me decide(being pregnant as well i just don't need the stress either)
lots of love to everyone for reading and for your replies
chatee

kyliebump- I'm confused about this hours business. Ds1's proposed statement says he will get 0.8 of support. The shcool have told us that they will fund the other 0.2. The statementing officer told us children never get 1.0 in the statement.

However I was speaking to a friend with the same statementing officer who recieved her proposed statement the day before us. Her son has 1.0 specified in the statement (and I have to say his needs are considerably less than ds1's- for exampke he talks fluently, he has no learning difficulties, subtle language problems- but not like ds1 who only understands nouns and nothing else!). I thought it might be because for some reaosn the LEA would be funding his whole 1.0, but apparently not, his mum said a proportion of that will be funded by the school. What on earth is going on? We have a meeting with the offcier in a coupe fo weeks but any ideas?

Hi Jimjams

Doesn't seem to make a lot of sense to me. It's much more usual for LEAs to do what is in your statement (ie a percentage funded by them and a percentage by the school)as LEAs delegate some SEN funding out to schools. The only thing that I can think of is that some LEAs have some categories of need funding delegated to the school e.g ASD, SPLD etc but if a child has needs that do not fall into a category then all the funding has to come direct from the LEA, e.g medical needs possibly.

It's unlikely that the LEA Officer will discuss another child's statement with you (even if you are friends with the parent), so best to concentrate on getting DS's statement to a point that you are happy with. I know you have ongoing issues (hopefully soon to be resolved!) with the MTA and SALT provision, but are you happy with the support they are offering? If you want full time support specified in the statement but the LEA won't do this, then perhaps they would agree on a form of wording which indicates that 0.8 will be provided by the LEA and 0.2 will be provided by the school from within the schools own resources. Although the statement usually only specifies what the LEA have agreed to provide, they may be happy to put in the wording to make it clear in the statement that he will be receiving full time support.

Hope that helps

thanks for your message kyliebump-it's great to know that people do care!
we have now received the final statement-
dd will receive 7 hours support out of the 12.5 hours of play sessions.
dd will receive 2.5 hours support out of the 2.5 hours she stays for lunch from a mid day supervisor(that is 2x 1.5 hours sessions that i pay extra for)
i did ask could the mid day supervision not be included and the extra hours be given during the play sessions(due to the fact there are less children that stay for lunch so therefore a smaller staff:child ratio) but was told this would not work as mid day assistants are paid less than learning support workers!!
they are going to hold an interim review in December "to see how it's going" but I think I have until the end of September to lodge an appeal, so will see how she has coped for the first three weeks before deciding.
Unfortunately i can't get hold of the playgroup leader as it's the summer hols so it will all have tobe done when we go back...
The education officer actually said he wants to see the staff give more input and attention to inclusion for children with special needs, but to be honest i don't know whether that's his way of 'passing the book'IYKWIM....
WILL keep you all posted on the situation(aaaahhhh)

Chattee - This might be a daft question, but have the LEA definately issued the final statement and not their final version of the proposed statement? The final statement should be signed, dated and have a placement confirmed in Pt4. The letter sending the final statement should have included information about your right of appeal. If the LEA have issued the final statement they should have consulted with the preschool before confiming the placement in Pt4 - do you know how the preschool responded?

Sounds like a good plan to discuss with the preschool asap at the beginning of term before deciding to appeal - you could, however, lodge your appeal now to get the ball rolling, and then withdraw the appeal if it becomes apparant that your dd is doing fine with the support put in. Timing might be a bit tight, but if you lodged the appeal in a couple of weeks then by the time you are asked to submit your evidence, she will have been there for a couple of weeks, and you will also have had a chance to talk to the preschool. I think your approach is the best way forward, but if you are pretty confident that you will be appealing, then that's another option to think about.

How about asking for the interim review to be brought forward to the October half term?

Difficult to tell about what the LEA officer was saying - did you get the impression that he was genuine?. I know I'm not going to express this very well so please don't shoot me down - but it can be difficult for LEAs to get schools to play their part in inclusion. (I know there are massive issues about LEA's, funding etc etc etc, but just trying to raise a different point about schools!). School's can sometimes view SEN children as being 'outside' of their school population and need to be encouraged to think flexibly about how their staffing can be used to meet the needs of children with statements - they can tend to think that SEN automatically means 100% support for that particular child, which can then result in that child not getting his/her fair share of the resources that should be normally be available to them within the school ie SENCO, classteacher, classroom assistant support.

If your dd is getting 7 hours per week, then that's just over 1 hour per day that she will not have a dedicated support worker. She will still have access during that time to the other members of staff. Planning is obviously going to be key here - would the nuresery be able to structure the session so that she is either able to be supported by one of the nursery's own staff during that time, or doing things that she can do without support, and do the stuff that she finds challenging during the time that she has the assistant. Is she vocal? Would she be able to alert one of the staff members if she needs assistance to move between activities or go to the toilet?

Sorry, didn't intend to come back with a heap of questions! Given that you can't talk to the preschool between now and September it might be best to try and decide your plan of action for then and then try and put it to the back of your head for August and revisit this thread then!

Hope you are coping OK with this heat - I cannot even begin to imagine what it must be like being pregnant at the moment!

Just thought I would say that ds's paediatrician called today, to say she is officially notifying "the department" of the intention to statement him. So it's all starting for me now. Headaches on the horizon?

yeah, can be lou but i think better to get going now rather than later...how old is your ds now?(i think he is just slightly younger than my dd if i remember correctly)
are you still enjoyong the benefits of your visit to the bobath centre??is ds still trying to do more things??
my dd is coping well at nursery with her support and besides one accident(she reached over the water play table which was outside and managed to off balance it and her.....she had an imprompto swim and was soaking, split the bottom of the tray in half totally breaking it, oh and even managed to cut her finger in the middle of it all.......apparently the staff were horrified
when trying to put a plaster on dd's finger to help stop the bleeding she told the staff"don't be stupid it's sore you know"
i have helped out a couple of mornings as a supply nursery nurse and really enjoyed it.....
sorry to waffle still on a high from yesterdays scan and news it's a boy!!!!

Congrtulations chattee you must be really chuffed.

Yes lou it is a vile porcess but its best to get it over and done with iykwim. Tbh our statementing was pretty short in length in comparrison to some peoples - so there is hope

Oh Chatee congrats!! Hope dd is ok now. Ds is 2y 7m. It's being done sooner than I was expecting, but I don't mind, I just thought we would be doing it in December.

Fio, I am told by the pt that the statementing process here is usually quick and painless (!), but from hearing everything on here I will sit with a raised eyebrow on that one until I have proof!

yeah lou my dd was 3 in august, i wanted it ready for her pre-school year and it was...just!
hopefully yours will be too which will benefit your ds from the start rather than having to make do iykwim

congratulations chatee

The process wasn't too bad in the end Lou. We have receieved the final statement now - I need to sit down and read it properly, but I think it looks OK. Good luck!

Thanks, I probably won't have any news for ages now.

It should be quick and painless if you agree with what the LEA suggests. If not, then you've got trouble!! Ours took a year (partly due to lazy psychologist who took AGES to write her report as spends too long working on private stuff!). Our draft statement was rubbish and completely ignored what we wanted and what the professional reports had said. I think they put it out there just to see if we'd accept the default option of 12.5 hrs per week of m/s. We didn't! We didn't go to tribunal though but I do have a friend who not only went to tribunal but also to the Govt Ombudsman and won

Chances of it all being exactly what we want are slim I would think, so should I start weight training for this battle? Thank goodness I have you all, and your experience.

Inspite of all the anti-LEA things you hear, it is true that most of the individuals you deal with are very nice and don't have a plan to prevent you getting what your child needs. Unfortunately, they do not usually make the decisions and have to pass on everything you tell them to those that do. Usually they are simply over-ruled but I have heard of times when LEA people have "misrepresented the truth" following discussions with parents. THey probably didn't plan to do this but got into a position where their bosses would be giving them a b#++~cking if they agreed with the parent and, of course, these things are always open to invididual interpretation although that has been really stretched sometimes. You will sometimes come across a nasty git who is heavily disguised so you don't realise it at first. This is why, unfortunately, I think you do need to be cautious with them, don't always let them know what you are thinking and don't treat them as your confidantes but do try to strike up a good, friendly relationship with them. It always pays to pop into their office to deliver things and ask for them by name, once they have met you in person its very hard for them not to relate to you on a personal level. I also take a photo of my son to any meetings and have it stuck in the top of my file or somewhere they will see it but I don't obviously show it to them, works a treat. They then start to feel they know him too, as many LEA people will never have any direct contact with your child. As I've said before too, keep copies of everything and, if you can't drop it off yourself, send everything by Recorded Delivery. One last thing, remember to say thank you to them, they don't get that very often and it makes an impression, I take them in a tin of Celebrations or sometihng every Xmas and some cards with a photo of my son saying thank you (god what an a#+elick!)

Lol at your last comment Davros! Thanks for your tips though, I will digest and store for the future.