How much does ASD unit within a mainstream with full time 1:1 cost LEA?

[osospecial]

Does anybody know roughly how much this costs LEA or point me in the right direction to find this out please? Or does it vary a lot depending where you are?

A unit with 1:1 woukd be a very rare offering. Special school probably cheaper.

Unit around £15k with approx 1 teacher and TA for 8ish. However doesn't include additional therapies.

It would be very rare to find a unit with a full time 1:1. The LA would point you to ss if you needed full time 1:1 and tell you that this was a more efficient use of resources.

A unit is usually seen as a half way house, pupils are not yet able to access mainstream full time but given the intensive support of the unit, have the potential to gradually build up to accessing some sessions within ms with appropriate support (which would very possibly be 1:1 but only while in the ms environment - at least thats what the set up was for ds2)

One child at ds2's unit had his statement amended to include a 1:1 (increasing his support from 1 teacher and 2TAs per class of 8-10) but it was a short term thing while he was went through the process of transferring to ss.

You could try getting hold of the governors annual report which would give a break down of staffing costs. (at least it did when my dc were at primary)

Thanks both, we are going through statementing process at the moment, it looks like they will offer dd a place in an ASD unit but everybody involved so far (salt, assessment unit teacher, paed who did medical) has said she needs 1:1 support to keep her attention for any activity. I want to get ABA in the statement somehow so just trying to see how the costs for LEA compared. Merry xmas btw !

Yes, but there is often no interest in what the child needs to learn, only what a school needs to be able to keep the child there.

Units are variable. Some are simply containment units, some have aspirations towards 100% inclusion. Neither model works for all children and is based on the arbitrary motivations of the staff running them.

Some however DO start with the child, but they are fairly rare. The best example I have seen of that is Millbank in Westminster. There is also an ABA unit in Teddington that may do this.

Ds is in a mainstream school with 1-1, rather than in a unit, because the lea felt he needed the 1-1 and would take attention away from the others if he were to be in a unit.
Our lea wouldn't consider giving up a place in the unit to a child who also has a 1-1.

1:1 in mainstream is usually more costly than a unit place.

The cohort in a unit is also very variable and inconsistent as often where the children with unmet needs and consequently challenging behaviour go. I found 'some' special schools to be far better as they had embedded behaviour expertise.

Having said that, my Ds' SS doesn't and the children arriving towards the end of KS1 are turning his class upside down.

I have no idea which is best anymore, I keep going around in circles! I want a place in a local ASD unit as they are open to ABA there and i can continue it on some level but I'm being told there are no places (whether they will miraculously find one if it suits them who knows!) they are suggesting other units, which i dont want, one of which is 22 miles away! The other is only 8ish.
The other option is to try and get mainstream part time with 1:1 and part time home ABA programme. Which, from what I have learnt on here, is not very easy! And the time it takes to fight for something like that puts me off as dd is 4 and I just want her to be settled with the right support as soon as possible.
SA is over anyway so just have to wait and see if they issue a statement and what it says now.

DS unit's placement with all therapies and 1 teacher and 2TA was less than 5k according to the AR calculations and 18k would have been sufficient for 1:1 and all therapies in unit placement. And DS had weekly SALT and OT.

That said, I noticed that the NHS SALT charges the school £15 ph and OT £20ph.

I think it varies between LEA's, ie what provision they have in MS (I know in our local school 1:1 for 25h statement is less than 15k), how many units and how many special schools.

Are you already running an ABA program? Is your DD already at nursery/school?
Can you say that you want her in mainstream with an experienced 1-2-1 that uses strategies proven to work in a mainstream setting and which foster inclusion (ABA). And then liaise with the school/LEA to get your tutors as the 1-2-1? If your tutors cost no more than they would have to pay a suitably qualified and experienced TA and you can say that your tutors already know you DC and will therefore be best placed to work with her that may work. Also you can say that they will be working with her at home on any school targets which will help.

You may have to top up the tutors pay but in the short term this may be worth it if you can then gather evidence that the ABA is working?

If your DD is not yet 5 then she doesn't need to be at school full time yet and you can continue to do ABA at home also.

I'm not running a full time ABA programme yet, I do some at home and we have a tutor but only for a few sessions during school holidays really. I would need to find somebody to do a more full time programme in school/ home everyday if I went with that option.
Dd is in an assessment unit at the moment.
I wouldn't mind topping up TA pay if I could get an ABA tutor in as the TA.
Thanks for all the advice. Lots to think about.
If a statement is issued and it says ASD unit but doesn't name one can I then say I want a specific one or mainstream?

xmasShark, those figures are fictitious. I don't think school could get a real hour of SLT or OT for that amount. Unless it's shared amongst two children, ie actually costs double what they say.

The costings quoted should allow for things like national insurance, holiday/ sick pay, bank holidays, pensions etc. And silly things like photocopying, printer ink, the costs of running an appointments system and a medical records department. It's usual to allow for the time used for travel/admin/training/updates too: no therapist can spend the whole 37.5 hours a week actually seeing kids.

Here are the NHS pay scales Band 4 would usually be an experienced SLT or OT 'assistant' ie not qualified. Band 5 is usually the more recently qualified staff. Band 6 is a senior OT or SLT, perhaps with a specialist area.

Leicester cost a LSA at £11.81 per hour, and a teacher at £42.96. So your school should probably replace all lessons with SLT and OT sessions, they clearly have the bargain of the century!

Regardless of salary, OT and SALT should be factored at approx. £100 per hour of contact time. The £15 might refer to the actual hour but the rest is for meetings, reports, telephone conferencing, admin, delegating, photocopying etc.

It is what the NHS say it costs THEM that is the amount you need to quote.

Supervision, pension, tea, secret tribunal meetings with LA, panel discussions, CPD, petrol, attendance at specialist interest groups, maternity cover, sickness, IT technician, premises maintenance, phone contract..........................

Star, your LA really needs to just employ you as a troubleshooter

I did try once. I rewrote the SALT Department's Service Level Agreement which frankly showed them how shit or at least fictitious their provision was and how they could in fact make more of an impact with less, but more effective contact time.

It got me a meeting with a group of VERY senior SALTs who all sat on swivel chairs and pointed out to me that I didn't run their department and then agreed to everything I asked for that didn't include a new SLA.

From my fairly normal life and existence now I can barely believe that I did that btw. But it was desperate times, my ds' life was at stake and their provision as they were trying to deliver it was frankly nonsense.

Star, recycling is always good. Send it to the clinical commissioning group. FAO children's services lead.

In fact, pm it to all of us

We could all ask locally, eventually decent provisional could become the standard offer

The reason they couldn't deliver on my SLA was, as usual, because the actual resources they pretended to have was nowhere near the reality. I mean they had money and staff, but most of that got nowhere near the kids.

To deliver each child's provision at just 50% of what they said they were doing would require a significant increase in front-line staffing.

I'll have to look for it..... . It ain't a work of genius, but I got to the point of figuring it didn't have to be to at least ensure a few outcomes now and then, as opposed to none ever.

Seriously, they need to beef up their provision. At the moment, any (dodgy) private provider could come in & clean up. Already happened in several areas. And then you can forget FOI etc cos everything's commercially sensitive. Even the contract details (aka SLA)