Draft Statement.

[Willmum]

I have recieved my sons draft statment and have a few questions I thought you may be able to asnwers. Firstly they use a banding system to say how much support he gets. I was under the impression they shouldn't do this? Am I right or have I got this wrong?
Also according to this the banding is band one which I actually think is higher than it should be (although I'm not going to argue this).
It says he should get 27.5 support in whole class, small group and individual sessions (pro rata as he's in pre s-chool). It also says this may change to reflect needs etc - what do you make of this?
The statment referes to 'when he starts satutory school age? Does this mean they're not planning to put this in place until he starts in reception or y1 even? Can they do this? He's in state pre-school at minute.
Also there is very little quantified support in terms of salt or ot etc I feel I will need to challenge this.Do I ask for a meeting or teel them I want to appeal now?

Thanks

A banding system in terms of number of hours received is certainly used here in this part of Essex.

I would speak to one of the charitable organisations like IPSEA or SOS;SEN regarding Parts 2 and 3 of the statement document. These two parts are the most important parts of this whole document so they need to be right to start with.

SALT should be in Part 2 as well as 3. One of the above organisations could advise you more on this.

Provision should be both specified and quantified as required in law; from what you have written it is not. On that basis I would challenge what you have received.

The statement I think is rewritten when your child starts infants school (it will again be rewritten before entry into Juniors and then again before entry into secondary school. That particular process re secondary school starts at the Y5 annual review).

Far too vague-gives them far too much room to wriggle- may change to reflect needs?Yes,it wll need to,but what does he need now?Does he need SALT.OT etc.I got stuck with a vague statement,for ds when I had no advice-There is a lot of good advice on here -I'm sure someone will help you more than me (getting ds's statement sorted now! )

I agree that it sounds like the statement needs to be more specific and also with the recommendation to get in touch with one of the charities. Both are difficult to get through to but it's worth being persistent. This guide from ACE gives an overview of checking a proposed statement but it's best to get someone experienced to check your individual statement.

You won't be able to appeal until the statement is finalised. It's probably worth asking for a meeting to see what you can negotiate, but LAs can be stubborn so you may just have to tell them to finalise it, to allow you to appeal.

Do you have any reports recommending a certain level SALT or OT?