Special school to university?

[inappropriatelyemployed]

Does anyone know whether there are any statistics on the numbers of children who have been in specialist provision who go on to university?

Does a specialist school place impede in any way?

I look at reports for some Indy SS and they are often rated very highly by Ofsted but expectations of academic achievement are substantially reduced so you get phrases like 'compares favourably with national averages' even in reports for AS specific provision which is considered outstanding. Why? This wouldn't be considered outstanding for mainstream schools.

I know there is more to Indy SS than academic provision but at 65k a year, you'd be wanting some decent exam results too.

Yes, you're right. JR is the way to go

Money?

Precisely. Just give me what you would give someone else - or half of it and I can make ten times as much progress with none of the stress.

Very much doubt you'll get any money from them. You may get some sessions with LA employed home tutor (not of your choice) or some text books, or an agreement that they'll pay public examination fees, but can't see them giving you the hard cash to spend elsewhere.

There is all this pathfinder personal budget and direct payment stuff but a year and a half after it started here I am the only person with. SEN DP which I got only after threatening judicial review as they were refusing to let me even apply.

If you could see the DPA email disclosure in which they are faffing around and holding meetings because of a disparity of a few hundred quid between our SLT's costings and their own nominal costings, you realise they are never going to fund something running into thousands.

The direct payment pilot is a total farce and they all gladly accepted 250k for it!

However, in other LAs, advocates and lawyers tell me, they have arranged direct payments etc even without a pathfinder as it has been agreed this is the best way forward. So I think everyone has been keen to cheer this on as it is the most sensible way forward for DS on the basis that this LA 'is better than most' etc and they are good at looking reasonable while doing nothing.

I have doubted that they would ever pay over a substantial cheque but looked like the vexatious whinger

Perhaps now it will be realised that these people are as underhand and devious as I know them to be.

I think you should have control over those coming to your house. Something strange happens to people when they are paid directly by the LA and I have lost trust in people before because of this.

inapropriately, you seem to be set on HE and I admire you for that. Sorry I am late for the party. My AS DD is doing her GCSEs in a mainstream school with a statement, she is very bright and hopes to go to uni. We have excellent support at school with all the SLT, OT etc, so it could be done, though after tribunals. Indeed with her TA she does stick out a lot and I would say it diminished her independence and defined her in some way, she relies on the TA and uses her as a resource and as an excuse sometimes, basically it shaped her in some way. However I know DD wouldn't cope with school otherwise and would "stick out" even more. It is impossible to say how she would develop without the TA. I know of a boy from DD's primary class who also has AS and is coping with school without a statement, but he has fewer diagnosed conditions. I certainly thought that a SS would be a trap for my bright DD - it would set her for a life of dependence. I thought she needed to be included in mainstream life, even if it 's uncomfortable at times.

I also know that I am not the one to HE. I would not cope with relentless full responsibility for DD and would not be able to offer the whole range of educational and social experiences she has at school.

DD struggled with Art and DT, and hates PE viscerally. But we have been able to narrow her GCSE choices down to subjects she enjoys and is good at, even PE is now dedicated to her OT exercises. So I concluded that [after tribunals and relentless fight] you can carve the provisions in mainstream school exactly as DC needs them.

What the first year of GCSE taught me is the huge unknown factor of fatigue and coping with workload. This is definitely the pressure point where things could go wrong for DD. So I can see how you can avoid this problem with HE. What happens with DD is she spends time at school and comes home tired, then she spends time at home doing homework from which she does not learn, and then she does additional revision with me from which she learns, but something got to give...

May I inquire how you teach your DS to cope with fatigue? Could I PM you?

Of course. Do PM me.

I would never say never about anything Vanilla. I just know what works now and what doesn't. This may change as DS grows but keeping his confidence in tact is the priority.

I think this flexibility and responsiveness is what the system can't cope with. You re either in a mainstream or SS or in school or out.

I certainly thought that a SS would be a trap for my bright DD - it would set her for a life of dependence. I thought she needed to be included in mainstream life, even if it 's uncomfortable at times.

'Inclusion' and 'independence' are incompatible for DC who are not able to access the curriculum in a mainstream classroom without 1:1 support. I should add that Daphne Keen, Margo Sharp and Ruth Birnbaum all were of the opinion that it was essential for DS1 to develop independent skills for learning and living in general and that it was not possible for him to develop these skills in the m/s. Rather they believed that m/s would increase dependence as, specifically in that environment, it was not possible for him to operate independently. At the hearing they talked scathingly to each other about the irony of the LA writing in the WD that DS1 needed to develop skills of independence but then naming f/t 1:1 in m/s. Support could not gradually withdrawn because DS1's so called independence depended on it!

DC who also need 1:1 despite being in a small class with specialist teachers and similar peers because they are not able to be independent in any environment are a different issue to the one I experienced. DS1 has APD and is unable to hear in any group over around 6. He also has SPD and is overwhelmed by 'normal' sensory environments. Not only does this increase anxiety (manifest as tics and selective mutism at school but challenging behaviour at home) but all his ASD symptoms as well. It actually helps that he is a weekly boarder as there are less transitions from one environment to another and triggers for refusing to attend school.

If DC require 1:1 to access an overwhelming (to them) environment, the curriculum, GCSE's etc, then to my mind they are not developing skills of independence but learning to be dependent on another.

I think it perhaps is a matter of what is right for any particular child and any particular family. There are no hard and fast rules about SS, m/stream, residential etc.

You have to get through it as best you can, working out works for you and your child as best you can.

I agree that m/stream environments with high levels of support can be isolating and non-inclusive but I also think that SS are not always the right course in every case.

I think the system lacks vision and flexibility to change provision to meet needs as no one can predict a child's future or what works best at any given time.

Of course it is a cliche that all SN DC are different. I agree that SS is best for some while mainstream is best for some others. Some even cope without 1:1 and not all parents can HE. Flexibility is what is needed.

On the point about 1:1 in m/s my experience basically is that it can be developed into a positive appropriate provision with the right statement resources, the right school and the right relationship between school and the parents. The latter is much more important then the LA imo.

For AS Dc, the benchmark for inclusion and independence will always be different. These Dc are different and can best function in their own way when they are ready. I believe AS Dc are open to development, but it comes in their own time. It is important not to delay and not to rush things. For example I feel comfortable if DD would miss out on underage drinking and sex. I think for the moment DD has as little scial life as she can cope with and the main thing is that she is comfortable, in control.

I try to help her to achieve her goals, no matter how ambitious, by using her strengths and her difference to her advantage; learning to be in control of her life. This is how I define inclusion and independence.

I think that is a good approach. For us, DS has been failed twice by TA support in m/stream as this has always led to issues being forced, disparaging comments and conflict. I think it is little wonder that he feels school is not a positive place to be.

Also, HE is something that has been forced on us in the past by flexi-schooling and then a previous period of HE. So it's not that I can HE, I have had to after years of having to pick up the pieces. This has meant I have had to change my working life entirely. So instead of working full-time on a fat salary with a pension etc, I have had to freelance and earn a fraction of what I could, more frequently recently by living by my wits and inventing and obtaining funding for my own research ideas. Working eves and weekends.

I admire you inappropriately. I had to abandon a blue chip career as well with the childminders repeatedly letting me down and not being able to afford a full time nanny with 3 dc. I couldn't even cope with free lance with all the dc issues. I like to be able to focus on my work. I am inappropriately unemployed trying to get back to work, if I don't get caught in a tribunal appeal again.

Why can't the system just work so we could have a life?

Vanilla - I feel for you. I do. It is a nightmare. I just try and concentrate on how great both my kids are. The rest of it all isn't really worth a jot. Or that is what I tell myself to keep myself sane!

On the topic though, what would be the best way to assess the DC's chances of getting to uni from a special school? Would it be to ask a uni where from AS Dc are coming to them?

Are any DC getting 8 A* in SS and going to uni?

If it takes continuous conflict to deal with m/s school, what guarantee is there that a SS would do what is right? Wouldn't they just do what suits them behind closed doors?

Yeh, looking at DC is what keeps me sane too.:)

On the topic though, what would be the best way to assess the DC's chances of getting to uni from a special school

Vanilla - It depends on what sort of Uni you want. If you're talking Russell Group or former poly? The main thing (as recommended by his specialist FE placement) was for a campus university where everything was on the one site. We never expected him to be Oxbridge material as he was just too anxious during his A levels. Anu local Uni that allowed him to live at home and do the course he wanted would be quite suitable.

In the end I played the disabled card as he did not have sufficient UCAS points for the course BUT could not live away from home either as had no independent living skills. So I basically said to the Uni if you don't have him then he will have no opportunity to go to Uni. Anyway they kept banging on at the Open Day about AS level grades not being predictors of eventual HE success - so I held them to that . They let him in.

There is also the Open University which will accept students without any prior qualifications (some rumours this may change due to financial pressures). Obviously not good for teaching social skills but academically fine for those who are self-motivated. One possibility might be to do a one year certificate course with the Open University to prove academic ability and then transfer to a conventional university if you also want the life skills experience.

Thanks. Some very, very interesting points here.

I think when you watch any of Sir Ken Robinson's stuff on TE, you can understand how tired and dated our education system is generally and how out of step with modern society. A society where we can work flexibly, move between borders more easily or work internationally from home. What are we training kids for in school? A 9-5 job where everyone is capable of writing and saying the same thing? I do wonder.

Then, if you have an Aspie kid, you realise how inflexible the system really is. The choices on offer seem to be between 'inclusion' in a mainstream which largely doesn't understand them or segregation in a SS which may prioritise meeting need but may also see the child defined by their disability. Not in all cases, but for some children that is how it might fee;

To me, the provision needed to meet the ever changing challenges of a modern world seems miles away from the stark, very traditional choices on offer.

on TED ..

Polter - yes, I too researched alternative ways of getting DS an education. Before he obtained his residential placement, when it looked as though he had been totally abandoned educationally I looked at all the FE colleges locally to see what GCSEs they offered at night school. A surprising selection was available in those days. Some were even available on Saturday mornings.

The problem was that DS still needed 1:1 to attend FE night school and although his course would be free I would have to pay for my course just to be able to sit alongside him. I managed to persuade a couple to let me have free courses so I could provide DS's support (I supposed it saved them quite a bit in providing their own 1:1 support for him). In the end he got a suitable res placement just before the start of the autumn term so we didn't need to do night school. Just shows that FE can be very flexible.

The choices are very stark as sometimes it is difficult to judge what is best even with best of insight. I don't know how DD will manage the fatigue and GCSE workload, what if she breaks and fails her exams? The school threatens to not admit her in 6 form without a B in English. Currently she has a D.

What would be the trigger that makes it more desirable to take DC out of mainstream into residential or HE? What was it for you?