Statutory Assessment refused........

[nickminiink]

Hi, My 10 year old son has been refused SA as he is not on the 2nd percentile in all areas of difficulties and that is basically how they made their decisssion, final, he is 2nd percentile in a couple of areas and averages 8th percentile in other areas. I obviously challenged this and was told this is the criteria of Leicestershire LEA, is this normal across all the counties ?. All they said is you have the right to appeal and speak to Parent partnership, I did this and I am now going down the tribunal route, which could take upto 6 plus months. I have fought so hard in the last 9 months to get this far and now have to start all over again, it does make you re-think "why the hell I am putting myself through all this stress, anxiety and disappointment" and puts doubt in your mind if your child does have SN and severe enough to warrant additional support via SA, as I get the impression no wants to help my son other than me, and I am not enough, so you feel like you are letting your son down, horrible feeling. Anyway got back to being positive today, and now I am challenging the school with regards the provision provided to my son, as in the report the LEA think they are doing enough to help my son progress (in 5 years nothing much has changed, he has progressed alittle but still 3-5 years behind his peers, he has 1:1 2 x 10mins per week with a TA who is not always able to carry this out due to other commitments or abscences). When I ask my son if anything has changed within the class room to help him he says "no", when I am told he has a word book to refer to for words he has diffiuculties with spelling & recalling & should contain certain work instructions, as he has poor auditory memory, they were suppose to introduce colourful schemantics to help with sentence structuring, chunking strategies and so on. This all looks good on paper and the LEA without seeing my son concur, so I have arranged a meeting with SENCO to discuss this and his IEP's which are a joke. I don't think she was ready for me this time as she tried to back track, telling me she was busy and couldn't see me for 2-3 weeks due to meetings etc, got an appt in 2 weeks after half term. I thought working full time & long hours in an Engineering environment in todays recession hit country of ours was stressful, but god this is up there. So my hat of to all you mumsnetters who have gone through this long, stessful and miserable process and those on the same journey as me good luck.

You don't have to do it alone, you probably know but incase you don't alongside parent partnership there are national organisations such as IPSEA and ACE that can assist and also have online information that can be accessed.

I would agree it's stressful but at the end of the day if we don't challenge (as positively as we can) authorities to get what our children need, who will? Good Luck, I hope it goes well for you, I think CLASP are really helpful but not sure if they cover the area of Leicestershire where you live.

Lack of progress is based on what is appropriate for the child. Some children on here have statements who are ahead of peers academically but behind on social stuff etc. Your child should be making appropriate progress in each area there is no requirement to be behind in all areas. It's all in the sen code of practice. An appropriate education means appropriate to every single one of his needs. Someone who sits on tribunal panels told me that! Is he transferring to secondary? If so ask the tribunal to expedite the hearing fill out the request for changes form.

Counties pretend to have their own guidelines, pretty much like you state, but the still have to follow the SEN COP which states:

7:34 In deciding whether to make a statutory assessment, the critical question is whether there is convincing evidence that, despite the school, with the help of external specialists, taking relevant and purposeful action to meet the child?s learning difficulties, those difficulties remain or have not been remedied sufficiently and may require the LEA to determine the child?s special educational provision.

So, what they are telling you is illegal. The only doc that counts as the SEN COP.

"My 10 year old son has been refused SA as he is not on the 2nd percentile in all areas of difficulties and that is basically how they made their decision"

Do seek independent advice from one of the charitable organisations out there like IPSEA and ACE as this sounds awfully like blanket policy. Not all counties are as blatently unlawful but many of them do try and weedle their way out of issuing statements.

Blanket policy is illegal and it also sounds like your LEA are trying to dodge their statutory responsibilities here. Am glad you've got your appeal into SENDIST.

the poster who mentioned the SEN CoP is correct. For the time being at least it is 'what LEAs have to adhere to - regardless of what they try to do/tell you.
Get yourself a copy of it, read it then read it again and again.
Submit an appeal to SENDIST re the refusal to assess and start quoting the ECM agenda at the LEA and the SEN CoP so that they know you mean business and that you know your stuff.
One of the things I most object to about having an SEN child is that I have had to 'professionalise' myself in the language that is spoken.
Getting hold of the CoP was the best thing I ever did

The SENCo at DS1's school wants to apply for a statement for him because he came out as on the 99+th centile in the cognitive tests they gave him but he's completely unable to show that in class because of symptoms of his Asperger's and ADHD. According to her, it's the difference between what they're capable of and what they're achieving that's more important, not an absolute figure in any test.