Statement of educational needs - help!!

[Lozzie12]

My 8year old DS has been diagnosed from age 5 with ASD / aspergers, he has been on school action plus with school saying they can cope on this. Recent hospital visit diagnosed dyslexia and specific learning difficulties in numeracy and literacy ( he has been placed in bottom 1% of peer group for these subjects). Hospital find it incredible he has no statement of educational needs in place and are supportive of our application for this. Application for this today has been refused by LEA for school he attends and passed onto another LEA (of the borough in which we live, even though school is only half a mile from house). Just to complicate matters we are a Military family, this is his third school, we arrived here 6months ago and are likely to be posted again within the next 6 months. This is the first time I've posted on here, does any one have any advice for how I should progress?

Contact IPSEA www.ipsea.org.uk/ they can be hard to get through to but they have a wealth of advice.
SOS education is another advice service www.sossen.org.uk/
I would also contact the Autistic Society
Good luck

If he is in the bottom 1% he should def get a statement. That is normally the criteria for getting a statement for dyslexia - even without ASD.

Have you applied for a statement at the moment? Are you in the 6 week initial waiting period?

It should be really easy for you to get a statement. So just get all the paperwork done.......

You should definately apply for a Statement. As others have said contact IPSEA, also your local parent partnership to see if they can help. There is blog on here and a thread 'life with an autistic son' which has lots of statementing stuff on, and some useful threads about statementing. Good luck and MN is always very helpful.

ipsea are 'on holiday' this week and next week, think back in the office the 30th but it will be really hard to get through to them so don't give up!

Thank you for your messages, they are a great help, we have just applied for a statement and are now waiting for a response. I have been told today by military that DS and I can stay here until statement is sorted, even if DH posted elsewhere.

Will Military fund any private support while you await statement as these things can take months? Or would they fund a private school placement?

Hi Lozzie12

On what grounds was your son refused a Statement?. (You would have needed to apply directly to the LEA within your local area).

Do appeal their crass decision not to assess asap; you need SENDIST if the LEA refuse to assess.

BTW the only criteria that should apply for a statement is need; anything else can be regarded as blanket policy and blanket policy in law is not allowed.

That is the correct procedure, the statement would be provided by the local authority that the child lives not the one where the school is. This doesn't mean it has been refused they are just following the regulations. It is your LA that is responsable for doing the statement not the schools LA.

SSAFA also produce a booklet 'Special Needs A Guide for Parents' if that helps.

sounds a similar situation to us. DD is 7. She has Asperger's and dyslexia. She is below second percentile in reading/literacy. We also live in one LEA but DD attends school in neighbouring LEA. That does mean you need to apply to the LEA that you live in, but shouldnt matter in the end. Unfortunately we have just received letter refusing assessment for dd for the second time. Sigh. Tribunal here we come! Good luck with your application.

Poor you. Sossen told me not to apply for a statemment for ds1(7) yet. LEA are playing silly buggars, apparently. And because he is bright, AS, the school says he has no needs at all, and he's not even on a SA, let alone SA+. No IEP. Twats. Hope you get this sorted soon, OP,