Another Proposed Statement

[justintimefortea]

Follow on from Cats...

I too have a proposed statement a week ago. Have been through it and the reports carefully with friends.

The objectives (tho very long term) are good and what the say is needed to meet them is fine (again all wooly but ok in that its there and it can not be got out of)...

However...

How the provision will look in school is very non specific - we can choose a special school or mainstream. In Mainstream he needs access to a LSA for 30hours a week to deliver the programmes as described, etc, etc.

Now I KNOW I should challenge this HOWEVER I have two issues:

a) He was failed really badly by his last school and moved less than a month ago - we don't know what was environment or his actual needs as some really simple stuff hasn't been implemented consistently or at all. Basically I don't know what he needs at school not really.

b) I don't have the energy for another fight - the last one, to get him moved, nearly destroyed me.

The EP is good and put that his report is provisional. He has also said he thinks the statement should be reviewed very early after acceptance (3-6months) but there is no mention of this in the statement - just a normal review in a year. I have emailed and asked him if he would support a formal request for this.

Local Parent Partnership are not brilliant and IPSEA are closed. School have not responded to an email asking if they wanted to see the statement either.

If I accept the statement as it is could it realistically be changed later on?
I honestly don't know what he needs in terms of 1:1, working in small groups and everything general I have mentioned they have covered.
He's high risk of exclusion due to behaviour. New school are putting in 18hrs 1:1 before statement anyway and have a DSP unit which they are earmarking for him anyway.

Any tips?
Please, please be nice. I have had severe anxiety problems over school and I am just getting better. I can't take on the world and the professionals again at the moment but I don't want to make a really, really bad decision.

Honestly? If you're not able for a massive fight right now? Then forget mainstream and go for special school. In MS you fight all the way, all the time about everything. Even stupid minimal things like pack lunch contents. And the constant anxiety of knowing staff know jack-all about complex SN is unreal.

Special schools will have better budgets, ratios, training, therapies input, relevance, tailoring to your ds's needs... All of these are a million times better in most SS than in even the best mainstream.

You can home ed the extra bits of academic stuff if need be. Much easier than meeting a whole host of other needs yourself.

Ipsea reopen tues morning. Could you reject proposed statement and request a meeting and the get in touch with ipsea ASAP and go from there.

That is my current plan along with going through all the reports with a fine tooth comb and seeing what they say provision should be.

Sympathy though I feel out of my depth here.

What Maria said!

I used to think that if a child could manage in ms, they absolutely should stay there, but the truth is ms schools are less and less able to cope with our dc's due to cuts, politics, lack of training and funding about the simplest of things which really don't need to be expensive or even cost at all in some cases.

In MS you are in heavy competition with the other parents for resources for your child, and teachers/schools prefer to treat you with contempt as a pushy anxious parent who cannot accept her child will never amount to much.

If you are being offered Special School, my advice would be to grab it with both hands. LAs don't offer SS places without good reason, because they are expensive and for every child that gets one there are at least 10-15 who would really benefit from one but are being shoe-horned into a MS place for space and budgetary reasons.

Hi justintime,

I know exactly what you mean about not having the mental energy to face another fight so soon after the one you've just been through. (I'm struggling myself to cope with feelings of panic whenever I try to fight for appropriate help for my ds with his mental health issues and a lot of that is down to not wanting to have to go through a repeat of the nightmare we had getting a new school for him 18 months ago.)

But if you can face it, it really is worth while getting the statement as good as possible to start off with. It sounds like you are happy for the school where your ds is now to be named as suitable provision and as it is mainstream that is one less battle for you. The fact that they are offering special school as an option is also positive as it shows they recognise the extent of ds' difficulties.

The advice we got from both ipsea and sossen - link here:

www.sossen.org.uk/contact_us.php

was to make a copy of the statement itself plus the reports in the appendices then go through them with different coloured highlighters say pink for anywhere a need is mentioned eg ds struggles to stay on task during writing tasks and blue for the corresponding suggested provison eg ds should have the support of a ta to prompt him/all instructions from the class teacher should be reinforced in the form of written instructions. Then you compare the proposed statement with the original reports and expand on or modify the vague/inaccurate/incomplete bits in the proposed.

If your contact at the la has not already done so ask them to send you an electronic version of the proposed statement plus any versions of the appendices that they have in that form themselves. (For confidentiality they can email it to you minus the first page with names & addresses on.) This makes it a lot easier to re-write the proposed statement. there are various tools in Word which help like strikethrough for delete this pile of crap, italics for a change to the wording, bold for an addition and using footnotes to show which report you are referring to to back up the change you are suggesting. Sorry if you are very whizzy on the computer and this is all too obvious but it wasn't to me at the time and I found having a structured way of disecting the woolly initial version helpful when feeling panicky wondering where to start.

DS is in MS, he spends 30h/week there and benefits from around 10h of it. The other 20h a week is just acting as poor quality childcare, and causes such stress that another 20-40 hours of home life is a write off. His academic levels are ok, but I've taught him much of that anyway.

My friends with dc in SS have a very different experience.

Plus it's relatively easy to get back from expensive SS to cheaper MS later, when you're ready to start the specified-and-quantified fight.

Wow - Thanks

Maria, Starlight & Lougle
I have considered SS however at this moment in time I don't want to go that way for two reasons -

1. DS is on the 85th centile for intellegence and has a reading age way above his actual age - the SS in the immediate area do not have facility for children to follow the national curriculum in it's entirety, only P Levels.
2. NONE of the basics (workstation, buddy scheme, behaviour contracts, visuals for ASD, time outs, structured learning) have been tried consistently some not at all. There is a feeling that we need to give MS a far go.

The school I have got him into has a DSP and shares a site with a SS - the kids from the SS who are working at National Curriculum do so in the DSP of the MS school.

Pink
Thank you - that is what we did - I too can highly recommend the IPSEA and ACE advice re: reading statements

Cat
I really don't want to delay the process if I can help it - we need to move from this situation. Also if I had a meeting there is not a lot I could say - I don't know what he needs yet.

You have made me think tho and I am now wondering about a really key thing:

Can I ask for a DSP place when I name the school?

(I know it's full but that really is not my problem - all the DSP places are full in the county for ASD)

I actually disagree that ss is necessarily the answer. It may be that it won't be a massive fight. If you are mainly concerned by the access to wording, why not just return with note with our preferred wording eg ds will receive 30 hours 1:1 TA support. I have had experience of both ss and mainstream and felt my ds very let down by poor ss placement. I can also empathise with your anxiety and lack of energy for a fight as having fought two tribunals I have at times felt like this. I now focus on what I see as the key issue. I have just had dd new proposed statement. I have checked the main things and have let some stuff go as I don't feel like battling at the moment.

Cansu

I am, I suppose, wondering if the statement is better left unspecified now and actually if it will allow tweaking later on?

Or am I living in a land of fluffy clouds and rainbows where the world is simple

An unspecified Statement is not worth the paper it's printed on. It absolves the LA from providing the true level of support a child needs.

I'm another one who thinks that if the LA are suggesting an SS - grab it. these places are so fought after that if they are offering it voluntarily it's proof that he needs it.

He's entitled to an education appropraite to his 'age and ability' so if he has the ability to take GCSEs then you should push for him to be able to follow the GCSE cirriculum in the SS.

Sorry Wet

Should have said - he's only 8

I'd still go with the SS. He can always transfer back to MS.

I have severe misgivings about SS for him... tho I am willing to hear what other parents experiences are...
I feel like I am drip feeding but it's hard to know what will be relevant.

He's high functioning ASD and some of his behaviours can be challenging at school so is risk of exclusion. He has anxiety problems as well.
He struggles with relationships with adults and to learn the curriculum however he has maintained an average level and it is noted that he is very intelligent and able.

On first meeting he does not even seem ASD - his language skills are on the surface good but he has no emotional literacy, is unable to make and maintain relationships with his peers.

Now at this point I also need to say that I am basing my reservations about SS on time I have spent working in one - I am not just scared of the unknown if you see what I mean.

He has just moved to his third school (has a DSP specifically for ASD) and I really don't want another move plus I want to give MS a go...
I don't feel he needs a SS place.

Do any of you have hfa in SS?

Does anyone know if I can request a DSP place when I request the school in Part 4 of the statement?

BTW - I thought the SS provision was fantastic... on reading it sounds like I had misgivings about provision but I don't just whether DS should be in one

Only you can judge - by knowing your own child and by assessing what the schools on offer have for him. it's a very personal thing.

My Ds is HFA in a SS, though I wouldn't put him in the majority of either MLD schools or ASD schools. We visited a scary number before we chose one and it is an experience I'll never forget!

I suppose it boils down to how much input you believe a school to actually have in your child's development at the age he is. My DS also had an IQ rating that put him on the 86th percentile.

FWIW I believe there is no such thing as a 'special school'. No two are alike. And also, a SS provision can fit your better because of the peers. DS's class has a mixture of ASD and children with some S&L issues who are very socially motivated. This means their language is slow enough for DS to have a good attempt at keeping up with them and they are very keen for DS to. Their intelligence is also normal-high.

Starlight

I think you have hit the nail on the head there.

Not all SS are the same and all have different kinds of provision / pupils in them.

In this area there is a known gap in the market when it comes to provision for hfa/aspergers with normal/high intelligence. My nearest school with such provision is over a hour away - would be impossible to get to.

I suppose thats why all the autism DSPs are full round here.

I have seen the 2 local SS and they are very much severe LD and complex needs.

I think I am going to find out if I can specifically name the DSP at his current school as where I want hi to go.

I'm guessing your thoughts on SS for your ds might be well known then. Could the SS offer be a tactic to make you back off and say "MS will be fine thank you?". Cos unit places are cheaper than ss but more expensive than supported MS (usually).

DS centiles are similar to your ds's and I still think mainstream is failing him

If the SS is same site as the mainstream, i think naming ss in part 4 might be a better way of actually getting to the unit... So youd name the ss but verbally say a unit place might be an acceptable alternative. LEA either offer it straight away, or transfer him in as soon as a place comes up.

If he's already 'in' the mainstream bit of the school, every other child elsewhere needing a place can actually queue jumps him. Their provision will fail worse than his, cos their schools are so much less asd aware.

Average primary place £4k, average LEA SS place costs £20-£25k.

primary place may be 4K but then you have the cost of the hours in the statement so for my son its £4k plus about £12k (according to ipsea ) so total is 16K per year - SS i want is for HFA children and is 8.5K per year and yet my lea refuse to name the school i want so hence we are off to tribunal to get the school placement. my elder sons school is 18k per year and thats a special school as well - i did a freedom of information request last year and the other SS i wanted was 15K per year. SS can be cheaper tham mainstream due to teh 1:1 costs

Yep but unquantified, untrained, unspecified 1-1 is free

I am in the position where I need to accept this proposed statement and name the school I fought to get him in (The one with MS, DSP and SS on site though the SS and MS/DSP are actually two seperate schools).

However I am wondering if I can buy myself some wiggle room with an early review and since reading your advice if I can actually request a DSP placement?

He has 18hours of 1:1 from September without the statement.