Can school refuse to discuss this?

[kmummy]

DS is 'meant' to be starting reception in September. We had a transition meeting in the week with his school, his nurse from the children development centre was there plus his key worker from his pre school. They will not tell me what kind of support he will receive, they say we have to wait for the final statement. Is this right? Both that work with him now pressed to the school he needs a full time 1:1 but it doesn't feel like it meant anything. I have no clue why will be happening in September for him.

When should his statement come through? I would expect the school to get him some 1:1 in the meantime, up to 10 hours a week in my LA for school action plus if needed funded by the school.

Statement is through but its proposed. He's been funded high block funding. But they haven't said 1:1 in the statement so I've sent it back highlighting this and am waiting for a response. He's only at a two word language level.

To be fair to school it is not them that make the decision what goes in the statement. They will have to wait and see what the final says, same as you. Once they know what funding they have they can discuss what they can offer.

So the high block means nothing right now? It's down to the wording?

I would have a chat with IPSEA as they are independent and have also seen this before. www.ipsea.org.uk

If statement is neither specified or quantified then it should be appealed against. A badly written and worded statement is not worth the paper its written on.

You may well have to get it finalised if the LEA do not budge and then appeal via SEND tribunal.

Its very much down to the wording used.

High needs used to vary from LA to LA, now (from April 2013) its supposed to be the same eg a place that costs more than £10k. So for mainstream would be £4k base funding that every child costs, plus £6k on top for 1:1 etc. So it would suggest to me the statement will be for more than £6000 worth of 1:1 support. But until the school actually know how much above £6k the LA is going to top up then they can't make a decision about employing anyone as they don't know how many hours they can pay for. Then as you say it depends if its dedicated 1:1 for your child or 'access to' 1:1.

Thanks ladies. I can defer him until January can't I? I don't see the LA agreeing to my changes easily and I can't send him in if things haven't been finalized.

If you think he needs full-time 1:1 you can tell them that he'll attend every hour he has a 1:1 and no more.

I did that and they LA said that they'll only fund 80% of however many hours he attended

So the school put in the rest otherwise they wouldn't have got him on roll at all and therefor received NO funding.

The school is right not to suggest support that they may not be able to give.

"High block funding" just means more than £6k.