TAC meetings

[2006hildy]

I have the most awful problem with TAC meetings not sleeping, feeling tearful. I feel I do most of the talking don?t really get to find out that much about G. The list of people attending can do nothing for my ds, will not be able to answer my questions and cannot make any decisions, - so, - it is really just a admin exercise isn't it?
TAC are supposed to be a chance for all professionals involved in a child's life to get together, be across developments in that child's life, and make concrete plans to meet the needs of that child. Note the 'concrete plans' bit. It isn't a big chitchat free-for-all. Every professional should end the meeting with something to do - some action to take that will improve your child's lot.
TAC meetings; ?they are all fine in theory but they can be a lot of hot air because nothing is ultimately done.? which is what I have found and going round in circles. I also feel they are really intimidating because they are the whole council against me. They all know what they are talking about and sometimes I don?t what my rights are so I feel steam rollered.
?TACS usually go hand in hand with CAFs. A CAF is a great big long document which outlines all the needs and issues of your child, which professionals are involved, what their role is etc. In theory, this is supposed to ensure that all your child's info is available to all professionals (usually on a computerised system), that you don't have to constantly retell his/her 'story' to new professionals that may come on board, and that professionals involved in supporting your child are kept abreast of developments in his life. They are extremely helpful in a small minority of cases. In many cases, they are used instead of a more time consuming and costly statement (in my experience). If a CAF is proposed, get the proposal and reasons for suggesting a CAF inwriting. Then you can consider whether you think it is a useful step or just a time wasting exercise to appease you and make you hold off going for a statement.? I feel like this

?Finally, remember to use it to your advantage. Make a list of all of your issues and questions and ask them. You've got everyone around a table, so use the opportunity. I used our first TAC to get CAMHS to say what they thought the school were doing wrong. They would never have done it in writing or an official report, but I teased it out of the CAMHS guy and then BAM - it was out in the open, the school couldn't argue with it and I had recorded it all in my minutes? This did not happen with our P levels.
I find the only way to get things done is to write a letter once I have found out my rights then to be faced with a furious school (who say I have been aggressive, when they have not agreed to anything I have said) who say we need to set up meetings first and then write a letter as their staff have rights too. Even though I explained I need a paper trail. I feel like I am being gagged.
EG I asked for a workstation for G, then wrote letter, then had a meeting, then Autism Advisory Service made a recommendation, then G got a workstation. Why didn?t they just say ok in the first place? They want to be seen doing all the work when it is me. I have a paper trail for this.
EG. In the TAC meeting they poo pooed any technology as I felt they want him to learn the old fashioned way but lots have people have been positive about technology especially if DS is good with it. I have paper trail for this mentioned on minutes of TAC meeting.
EG LSA went on maternity leave. New LSA said she ?did not like children? but was none the less looking after my vulnerable DS (emerging speech). I was told off for DS scratching and biting new LSA although he did not do it before or after new LSA was there for six months. I do not have a paper trail for this.
How do you get the most out of these meetings as I feel they are so precious and want to make the best out of what we have? I will give it another go but feel I don?t want to be there.

Sorry, I'm a bit confused by your post.
I know what TAC meetings are, and CAFs, but I don't know anything about your situation and am not clear what it is you feel you want, that's not being achieved ?
Do you have anyone in the meeting to act as your 'Lead Professional' (CAF) / 'Key Worker' (Early Support) ?
Break it down a bit for us, as there's lots of people on MN who will offer you support and advice.

Tac = team against the child
caf = conspiracy against the family

Take control.

Why are we here?
What do we hope to achieve?
Who do we need to seek agreement from in order to achieve?

Answer those 3 questions and you can plan your attack

Before the meeting- send out meeting objectives. (yours cos their agenda is to do fook all for your kid!)
Record all actions agreed. (e.g make them accountable for future meetings).
Record next steps (e.g date/frequency of future meetings, progress of current statement application etc).

Circulate action points asap after the meeting.

At the next meeting - START by logging progress against actions on your log. Maintain an action log. Any actions past their due date should be flagged as RED.

Date logged Action Acountable Due Date Current status.

I now refuse to attend ANY meetings for which noone can clearly articulate to me the purpose. I have a big black mark against my name from our local CAHMS for doing this, but since disengaging from the cahms farce, I've noticed all the other professionals have been able to make great strides in helping my child.

I was driven to the wall before I took this approach for my own sanity but noticed the "useless malingerers" no longer request endless pointless multi-disciplinary meetings to chat nonsense and those meetings that remain in the schedule are shorter, and infinitely more productive.

Took balls of steel to implement I admit - but I really felt I had fook all left to lose and years of smiling sweetly and being co-operative had just resulted in my sitting and enduring a slagging off at every available opportunity.

Oddly - relationships with the professionals are much improved. Only those professionals that can actually DO summat are still involved (instead of everyman and his dog's opinion sticking their oar in). DS has made such great strides forwards at last it's a joy for everyone involved.

Thanks bochead for answering a few of my posts. It is gratefully appreciated.

Thanks Backforgood. Situation DS 5 Dx'd ASD emerging speech, mainstream school. Wanting and achieving difficult because if you don't know what is out there you don't know what to ask for. I suppose I need to do more research for my son. Good questions to ask me though because it has really made me think.

What I want is more assessment/tests for my DS to determine the correct techniques to be used with him. I feel the not just Autism Advisory service but other services involved have just thought oh classically Autistic, emerging speech we will start on PECS and turn taking. Instead of really bothering to find out his strengths and weaknesses are.

'Lead Professional' they chose as SENCO which now I find is biased towards the school and when I sit in these meetings I feel it's the whole council against me. I phoned the CAF administrator who said it is not supposed to be like this at all and they are going to help me find someone (one of the charities or departments can't remember) on my side to be the lead professional. The school is happy with this because they don't had to do the work.

Hope this helps.

H

Do you have a parent partnership person who can help in these meetings?

Thanks for more information.
That's great that you are going to get a Lead Person from somewhere else.

Whereas I TOTALLY understand that you don't know what to ask for, as you don't know what is available, to be fair to the school, there probably isn't a lot available. I don't think anyone would be hiding things from you / not applying for something the think might help - if you think about it, the more support your ds gets, the better progress he makes, the easier it will become for the school as well as you and your ds, there's no logical reason why a school wouldn't be seeking as much support as they can. However all services are limited by finance. You have the Autism advisory Team involved, that probably is the sum total of the services available in your Local Authority. I'm not sure there are more assessments / tests to determine correct techniques for him - that will surely come through trying ideas with him and seeing what works, what doesn't, and what does once they've been tweaked a bit. Tbh, that will change over time too - as things evolve. What happens in our LA is the Autism Team come in and work with the child for a while to get to know them, and make suggestions of what has worked with other children. The school then follow up these ideas and see how effective they are for that specific child. Without trying things, I'm not sure how you could find out what works for any particular child.

I think what you say about not finding out about what his strengths and weaknesses are is something you could bring to the meeting. Were you involved in writing the IEP ? I think this is something you could ask for (as you should be at SA+ anyway) as you know him better than anyone else. That would resolve that issue.

With any meetings, it's always best to go with your own jotted notes of questions you want answered, and the more specific you can be about something, the easier it is for it to be resolved. In a meeting, it's so easy to forget to say something, or ask for something - this is where the notes come in. Good luck

Thank-you for all your comments I really appreciate it. I can see again. I am bumbling along slowly getting it all sorted. Since joining this site things have been rocketing along.

No I was not involved in writing his IEP's.

Yes we are using the suck it and see approach.

I will ask Parent Partnership if she wants to be the Lead Professional. They are supposed to be impartial but found her to be biased towards county but she is a really nice lady.

I will eventually bullet point my blurb.

Hx