Governors sided with school re exclusion

[coff33pot]

Got a nice letter from govenors handed to me after a positive (planned soft soaping) meeting today. HT mentioned she was sorry to give such a letter after such a good meeting but its a short letter saying that the govenors supported her decision to exclude.

I took it, thanked her and told her I will be oposing their decision.

So.......who do I contact to represent my son now?

good grieeeeeeeeeeeeeef

So sorry to hear you are being messed around like this. Wishing you well with the next step.

Here's a nice strong for you.

Sorry that they are still being shit heads.

Nothing to add but fuckers

Have you considered your local MP? At DSs old school the HT excluded him in similar circumstances and threatened that the exclusion might become permanent. (Totally illegal by the way as you cant turn a fixed term exclusion into a permanent one ). We contacted our MP who was brilliant and phoned the LEA on our behalf.

The HT trod a lot more carefully after that but after a few more weeks of trying to work with the school we withdrew him. The strategies they put in place just made the whole situation worse. Hes now at a different school : its been a bit of a rocky road as he had so much emotional baggage but they have been brilliant and hes doing really well. Best thing we ever did - I just wish wed moved him sooner.

Did all the good stuff today happen as a result of your complaint and an attempt to make you accept the decision?

Oh no. I am really angry that they sided with the HT. Although we were told that it was really unusual that our governors didn't, I had hoped that such blatant malpractise as you and Ds have suffered would be recognised. The regulations have obviously changed since 2006 when Ds's exclusion happened and in our case the HT shot herself in the foot by making it 5 days which gave us more rights, so I can't give more advice. However, I did find the ACE helpline really good and would recommend you try them to see what other steps you can take. I think the fact that they have finally decided to implement some strategies suggests that there actually are some guilty consciences about. Closing ranks however is something that schools are past masters at.

star yes the good stuff happened for that reason. I even got called in to the HT office two days ago prior to this as I cancelled the EP coming in as they had two and enough is enough. I had her telling me that there wasnt going to be an assessment, that the asd team was coming in with EP and she actually had a tissue to her eye pretending she was concerned when I said I am just so damn tired of it all.

3 years I have been saying let him have his cupboard to hide in or the library to work in. And today low and behold she sugests it out of the box as if its her idea to the asd team that he likes the cupboard perhaps we can give him that as he feels safe in it I bit my tongue.

Its good that they are doing it but at the same time proves that they failed him when he was excluded because none of it was in place. EVEN the language for thinking was started on monday!

I am doing a Michael Gove email and sending it to all 3 of his emails. And its long.

Fed up for you.
Don't think you have right of appeal for 2 days
Still evidence that failing him, breached equality act etc etc
Does the EP know about the exclusion?
You must have rattled them though.
I would hope they think much more carefully before doing it again, you may have changed things for the better.

Thanks Agnes.

Yes EP knows as she was at the LA review catch up at the beginning of the week.

Its daft as even now if they just said " we got it wrong" I would take it on the chin knowing that things will get better for others.

They have started things moving and so that is good but in the same breath if I let it go some other mother is going to go through the same grief and I cant have that.

I have sent the email about all the services here from dx to education and the lack of everything here. DS issue is in there too as an example of cornwalls failings.

It will probably be ignored but at least I told the government how crap it is lol

I am getting fed up flying solo

Coff33 - there is a formal route for complaints about academies. Used to be the ypla if you gOogled them you'd prob find the new organisation?

David Wolfe Barrister has a blog 'a can of worms' on academies - depressing reading though. You are supposed to complain to new Education Funding Agency but even they don't seem sure what they should be doing.
here

Been scouring that link Agnes. If DS school became an Academy last sept would they be classed as a new academy or an old one..........

new standalone acadamies agreement clause 63

?The Academy Trust shall ensure that all provision detailed in statements of SEN is provided for such pupils.?

for a pupil with a Statement of SEN in a maintained school, there is no direct obligation on the school to make the provision in question, but the LA is under an obligation and can use its powers under its scheme of financial delegation to force the school to deliver. The pupil can bring judicial review proceedings to force the LA to do that.

for a pupil in an academy using the new model, the pupil could bring a judicial review challenge against either the LA or the academy, or both, if the provision was not being made

for a pupil in an older academy, the pupil would (as explained in this post) have to bring the challenge against the local authority, which would be powerless to force the academy to make the provision; and there is no way the pupil could challenge the academy.

If its an older academy then the last paragraph makes sense in that the LA are saying that the provision in the statement is just a "summary" of provision because the LA are powerless to enforce it?

Just thinking outloud....you may not be able to do much about the exclusion but can you file a complaint under the Equality Act for discrimination?

I would really get on the phone to Maxwell Gillot or another solicitors who have will let you have free advice. Getting someone else involved might be just what you need.

I'm pretty sure that if ds' school became an academy only last september that it is using the new model.

Another interesting article here:
www.maxwellgillott.com/news-mar2012-illegal-school-exclusions.htm

Yes I thought it would be pinkorkid but the fact that the LA were not totally putting their foot down has had me curious. They have helped dont get me wrong and the woman is lovely and insisted ASD Team be brought in and was not happy it hadnt happend yet. But something at the back of my mind made me wonder if they had any standing in forcing an Academy to do any of it when she politely said that the statement is only a summary of provision.

I have looked at that link to that was interesting. Think I will ring MG on monday and have a chat.

Look at your academy's funding agreement. It will have an annex arounnd sen. You can google it or try the academy's web page. It is quite possibly an older agreement signed before it actuaLly opened.

It says on their website that the "Funding Agreement means the agreement made under section 1 of the Academies Act 2010"