School funding: Guardian article

[inappropriatelyemployed]

See here for a very interesting article on school problems with the new funding arrangements for SEN.

This is the context to the SEN reforms. Good for IPSEA for raising it.

Thanks IE it is a good article. Scary stuff though. Home Edding is becoming more appealing by the day

Schools are getting dumped on big time and they need to stand with parents on these issues.

Not all schools are being dumped on. I'll post a link from Essex CC explaining the funding to all HTs when I am not on my phone.

The interpretation of DS2s school is that the delegated SEN budget is also used to fund G&T. SEN funding to SA+ is less than 5 hours of TA led off the shelf, out of class interventions.

All pupils on the G&T register had bespoke educational packages and 1:1 tuition in class. They are entitled to 6K as they are classed as having AEN.

Despite having high learning potential the school refuse to recognise DME and won't put DS2 on the register because he is under-achieving and would mess up their progress stats.

Thank you for this article. I'm sure this is why there was a sudden change in my son's school just before we got his statement and we were heavily encouraged to move him. As it happens we did move him and it's the best thing we've ever done, but I'm sure this is what was behind it.

I found this via Google
secure.essexcc.gov.uk/vip8/si/esi/content/binaries/documents/Primary_Funding_Letter_13-14_sept_13.pdf

and this draft policy for when the changes kick in
www.essex.gov.uk/Education-Schools/Schools/Special-Education-Needs/Documents/SEND_Strategy_%20Draft.pdf

Keeping - that is bad school. Is it outstanding by any chance? Sounds like DS's old school

We moved DS1 from a village school that was 'outstanding' that deliberately gets rid of SEN kids. They were the ones that reported me to SS.

The school we moved to and that DS2 started attending has a new head and chair of BOG who are determined to improve Ofsted rating. They were 'satisfactory' but a couple of weeks ago were judged now to be 'good'. The previous head focused on teaching not bureaucratic form-filling and box-ticking but the new one is utterly corrupt and chasing ratings.

We only kept DS2 in the school because they were doing lots of assessments with SALT, OT, EP etc and we needed some stability whilst fighting tribunal for DS1.

But now that I have applied for SA he is going nowhere until he has a statement. Afterwards is a different matter.

Just stumbled across this when i tried to find to find out if there were any similar publicly available documents for my own LA. It predates the changes and seems to predict the situation discussed in the Guardian article.
www.bristol.ac.uk/cubec/portal/pr4.pdf

IE - are you home edding still?

I think more and more SN kids will be reluctantly home edded over the next few years as schools become more skilled and adept at managing out of the system "complex" cases, (not always complex - just those kids who don't easily fit the right tick boxes). From a parental perspective I'd rather spend my money and time on direct therapy than expert reports for tribunal every other year. It's certainly less stressful! I can't be the only parent who has reluctantly come to this conclusion.

"The delegated funding system is the only model capable of breaking the alignment of interests between parents and schools to request additional resources from the local authority. The potential for litigation does not go away, however, but instead merely shifts to conflicts between parents and schools, rather than between parents/schools and LAs. Moreover, the considerable disadvantages outlined above, particularly for small schools and high need children, suggest that this is not a panacea to the problem of SEN funding."

This is what every head teacher and senco has been saying to me. They will take my daughter for reception so long as the statement has the funding. I am more and more convinced 'statements are not just about needs and provision, they are also about how that provision will be met'. Now we have two battles - ABA vs teachh and special vs mainstream

I would home educate in a heartbeat. If no primary agrees I might as well do that. Otherwise she will simply waste 100s hours per year at school.

It's the hidden disabilities lot that are at risk again. The school will try and pretend no issues so they don't have to fund themselves, unless there are issues, then they artificially inflate them in order to get maximum top up from LA, and then use the person that is funded in place of another TA they would have otherwise funded themselves.

But this is also an argument in favour of ABA surely, at least where schools and parents can come together. Because it is 'specialist intervention' it will be fully funded by the LA meaning the child does not eat into the school resources for a babysitting TA.

My daughter is in a small school. I went and checked last night what funding the school gets for sen - there's 22 kids in the school and their annual budget for sen is £5k - quite how they would fund the first £6k I don't get especially as another child has just been statemented as well. Can kinda understand why I will have all barriers put up to stop me applying for a statement for a child 4 years behind academically.

bjkmummy, if they only get £5k then they would simply go to the LA and say that their delegated budget is unable to resource all the provision needed. They would then get further allocations from the 'high needs block'.

Except that top-up funding from the high needs block is calculated on the assumption that the school has provided the first 6K and so the LA is only responsible for funding above 6K.

If there were statemented children in the school when the calculation was made or children who were unstatemented but had assessed high level needs, it would be clear that the school would need to provide the first 6K for those DC.

However, although there may be a legal obligation to provide the first 6K for all children, it is assumed that children on SA or SA + don't need anywhere near the first 6K funding and so 5K is sufficient to meet the needs of all the DC on the SEN register.

If DC did really need an extra 6K, then they would, of course, be recognised (by the school/LA) as having high level needs. Ergo, only DC with recognised high level needs ever receive the first 6K.

There is therefore the financial incentive to schools to minimise need and want to use the devolved SEN budget to meet the needs of all DC on the register rather than spend the whole budget on one child whose needs are likely to add up to, but not exceed, 6K.

"Except that top-up funding from the high needs block is calculated on the assumption that the school has provided the first 6K and so the LA is only responsible for funding above 6K."

That's not necessarily true, if there are more than the 'normal quota' of children whose cumulative needs exceed the delegated budget.

In those circumstances the school can apply for additional funding (top up funding is audited for an individual child). Schools are up in arms because even when they get additional funding it is for a nominal amount.

In my LA if the school is not able to meet the first 6K of all statemented children and have a remainder at least £105 per pupil on the school register to meet the needs of unstatemented children with low incidence, high needs, it can apply for additional funding.

So one statemented child in a school of 100 children would lead to a school having responsibility to meet the first £16,500 in order to be eligible to apply for additional funding.

I think to make sense of funding changes you have to imagine that SA and SA+ have already been abolished.

Legally all DC are entitled to the first 6K.

In practice this means that schools actually have to fund all DC with high needs regardless of whether or not they have a statement/EHCP.

These are the only DC for whom 6K is required in practice not in theory.

DC with SEN that are not recognised as being low incidence/high need do not 'need' 6K. This is how funding DC on G&T register is justified - top 3% is low incidence and so DC are justified in receiving up to 6K.

That isn't how the new funding (a national policy) works, keep.

From what I gather, the amount of the delegated budget barely covers that of DC with statements/high needs. So the school mentioned above may have a responsibility to fund to up 16.5K but have only received, say, 7K. Although it is the intention of the LA to increase the amount delegated to them in order to leave a remainder of 105pp to be spent meeting the needs of high incidence/low cost needs (ie SA and SA+), this is not actually happening at present.

lougle - the new SEN regulations will bring with them different practice. The changes in practice (day to day interpretation in schools) are being phased in along with funding changes.

As ever, what is written as policy and what actually happens in practice are two totally different things.

Loopholes are being found even before the policy becomes law.