Info anted about discrimination complaint/claim

[shelsco]

DS1 is dyslexic and running out of time in exams and dropping between 1 and 2 grades> (in year 10 atm). JCQ guidance states the evidence of his need as adequate and gives procedure to follow in case of late diagnosis and low processing scores which ds has. School not following procedure and not recording evidence because they think he'll be fine. He is dropping grades but now they won't back down (they initially put it down to nerves/lack of work) and are pretending they have no evidence even though he clearly can't finish exams. Looking at Equality Act he seems to have a disability which is disadvantaging him. All other avenues seem to be failing. School change to academy at end of year so no time to get complaint to school and LEA so LGO not a possibility. Wondering about disability discrimination complaint but not really sure what I'm doing and what's involved.
Can anyone give me idea of costs, waiting times, procedures etc? Also, is the 6 month limit 6 months from asking school to make adjustments or 6 months since they informed us they wouldn't make any?
Sorry, feel like I'm going round in circles and just want someone who might have more info than me. School are digging their heels in and won't budge so can't see any way to get ds the time he needs to finish his exams unless I go down discrimination route. Anyone got experience or advice?

The Sendist website has a really helpful guide to making a claim as well as the form that is required. To lodge a claim you just complete the form and send to them with supporting evidence. This has to be done within 6 months of the alleged discrimination occurring so in your case this would be when they informed you that they would not make adjustments. Once the papers are issued to school they have a limited timescale to respond. If they deny discrimination then a judge will look at all the papers and decide whether you have a case worth proceeding with.

Do you have written evidence of them refusing to do this? You need as much evidence as possible as school will be likely to deny everything. My case took 6 months from the claim being made until the hearing so I had lots of time to gather all my huge amount of evidence. From experience, you need to be aware that the school will not take kindly to your claim and may resort to all manner of things to try to discredit you.

The main issue you have is the school becoming an academy and therefore a different legal entity. This case is worth bearing in mind.

Have you considered contacting your MP or local press?

Thanks for that throughthemill. I had a feeling that changing to academy would mean no one would accept responsibility. School haven't said in writing that they won't make access arrangements. They told us orally, but in writing said that they don't have enough evidence but will keep looking. The fact that they haven't recorded the evidence we have and arent following the procedure JCQ regs recommend to get evidence in a case like this is not confirmed in writing, just orally. I've asked for confirmation in writing several times but funnily enough they just ignore it.

Have been to mp who has demanded another assessment. Thing is I don't trust LEA. I think they'll use tests which avoid his area of difficulty. It's very specific. Did think of press but am scared of prejudicing any future case. Not sure if it would affect way things were seen or not.