Experience of packages of support in statement

[Mamaq001]

Hi,

Does anyone (parents) have any experience of a "package of support" for their SEN child. These seem to be favoured by Local Authorities for the provision of support for statemented children, typically with several needs e.g. a bit of speech and language, a bit of occupational therapy, this party will do this, another party will do another thing.

If so I would be interested to hear of your experiences of how well this worked, in particular if aspects of this did not work, broke down after a while, whether there were communication issues between the support providers, etc.

Many thanks

Mamaq001

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Hi mama, I'm not really sure of your question,

If your child has SALT issues and OT issues, then surely they could benefit from both!?

Favoured by LAs as opposed to what?

I'm not too sure of your question either, sorry. Are you a parent going through the statementing process?

But anyway, erm, I'd say that the statement itself is a "package of support". Part 3 should contain and specify the support a child should get.

If you look through just a few of the pages of threads in this section you'll get a good idea of the experience of many of us regarding "how well this worked, in particular if aspects of this did not work, communication issues et "

Hello All,

Thank-you for the responses.

I am a parent going through a tribunal process and disagreeing over placement and approach. I want an independent school for the child, the authority want the child to go to authority school with bits and pieces of provision pulled from SALT, OT and other schools. Hence my question about real-world experience of this.

I think the main thing for me is whether any parents have children with more complex needs and are experiencing issues with this approach. I suspect many are.

Yes mama, we are/have done. But anetdotal evidence isn't going to work in a tribunal situation, unless you are just asking to seek clarification that the fight is worth it!?

The LA will call it the eclectic/holistic/individually tailored approach. Most of us here call it a 'pas the buck approach that gets as many people as possible involved so that accountability is unclear and lack of progress disguised'.

You need to aske them what they are going to do, what outcomes they are striving for and how working together will achieve this, and ultimately how progress will be measured.

They will answer 'to develop x', 'TAC meetings' and 'IEPs'. You need to demonstrate that this is a load of hot air and unreliable.

Thanks, StarlightMcKenzie.

Your response is interesting and it seems you are about as confident as I am. I'm working hard to demonstrate just the points you refer to. When I posted I hoped someone might have and be willing to share personal experience as evidence. Part of the problem in tribunals is you are quite isolated and an evidence base is difficult to build. As I've thought about this I'm not sure whether that would work as evidence in tribunal anyway unless it was taken as some sort of signed afferdavit (if that's the right spelling).

Still, on with the fight!

Personal experience as evidence won't work. Sorry,but it won't. You need to show why what they are proposing won't work.

For a SS you can show that the school does not have the ability, the training or the resources to 'embed' into the every day curriculum, the therapy that your ds needs. You can demonstrate that a ms school classroom doesn't have the flexibility or the staffing needed to respond in a timely way to your dc's needs to both head off problems before they become worse and to recognise and seize opportunities for development where they occur.

If you can show that your dc needs OT breaks every 15 mins, daily SALT with a qualified SALT and a consistent and flexible behaviour plan that all staff working with your dc are updated on daily, then it would be obvious that a ms school can't provide that.

Anecdotal evidence can't be submitted, no, but case law can (ie past tribunal rulings). Do you have a solicitor?

As Star says, you need to demonstrate why the 'support package' your LA is proposing is inadequate, and provide evidence why what you want is the only adequate and appropriate support. You need evidence and back-up from relevant professionals (EP etc) to do this.

I suspect you're being careful about wording and not giving too much away, but if you can (without revealing too much), can you say what kind of support it is you're fighting for? It is probable there are some of us here who have been down the road you're on, and can provide info and advice...

Mmmm, interesting responses and thanks for them. I don't understand all of the abbreviations I'm afraid.

As you say you don't want to say too much. My situation is authority vs independent and nothing about it is simple, quite the reverse. I understand there is a cost and a need vs provision element to this situation. The are aspects of costs to explore in my case but need vs provision is the main thing I'm working on and there's a fairly standard authority defence on costs. But when authorities don't take needs or your advice seriously there is no other place to go to but tribunal. I wonder if the green paper will improve things.

Yes there's a standard LA formula of offering 'eclectic' support - which means a bit of a mish-mash of meagre provision with no overall accountability or measurement of progress. And the support package generally offered is often a standardised one which may have little or no bearing on your child's specific difficulties or needs, and may be a kind of support which has no evidence of efficacy whatsoever, but, hey, why worry about that...

And you're damn right that the LA don't take needs or evidence seriously! Indeed it does seem that the only way to achieve this is by tribunal - although you might settle before you get to court itself (we did).

So. You have to demonstrate why and how the placement you want is the only one that can meet his needs. You need back up and evidence from all relevant professionals to do this.

The cost issue is relevant in most cases, even if on the surface your argument is suitability of provision. Because essentially all the LA cares about is cost - they won't usually argue against a type of support unless it costs more than what they're offering. So you should research costs (yours vs theirs), as actually you may be able to show that the two are not dissimilar (or yours may even be cheaper). All they'll really care about is not forking out, tbh.

Sorry for more acronyms. LA = local authority. EP = Educational Psychologist. SALT = speech and language therapy. OT = occupational therapy.

Mamaq, it is NEVER simple.

Do you have a legal bid to refer to? It's not absolutely essential but you have to yourself be quite legal savvy and also have gathered enough information about the tribunal process that isn't made available to parents easily.

MNers between them have a lot of experience of this but obviously to access it you'd have to give specifics which you might not want to.