Has anyone managed their child from mainstream tio ss

[Almahart]

Without there being a breakdown of placement beforehand?

My dc is not in class, is internally excluded not accessing curriculum occasionally excluded. Definitely needs ASD special school for secondary according to all professionals involved

Will they get it without trying a unit first? I was told today it was unlikely (by someone I believe)

Does he have an EHCP already?

Yes and lots of input from CAMHS. He's very very disruptive

Sounds like the placement has already broken down if he's exhibiting such strong signs of distress

I would get advice from IPSEA or SOSSEN and get started identifying a suitable school ASAP.

Yes I think so too. Have found a school we like, have an emergency review request in, TAC meeting coming up.

I was really thrown by this as the person who told me is a senior supportive sensible person

Sometimes people aren't all they seem.

When you're talking about him and his needs I would urge strongly that you think about how you describe his needs. Changing 'very disruptive' to 'very distressed' places the fault at those who should be supporting him rather on him. The disruption is the product of distress which is the product of lack of appropriate support and setting.

I know, we've been let down many many times!

Excellent idea about describing him as distressed. Absolutely

Good luck

I do know of children who have done this. I think ourvye who post's on here son managed to do so.

For my two the LA were very reluctant to consider specialist provision without us having tried at more than one school.

So ds1 went

Mainstream - PRU - Mainstream - PRU - Special School (not quite as bad as it seems as the PRU was based in the special school).

ds2 went

Mainstream - ARP placement - Special School - Home educated

What helps is if the existing school says they can not meet needs and any other mainstream or ARP choice say they can not either. So visit any prospective schools suggested by the LA, tell them the difficulties and ask how they would cope in certain situations. This should give you the ammunition to tell the LA the placements are unsuitable.

My son went from MS to SS as school were not able to manage his needs. As Polter so rightly says descriptive words are very important. The placement had broke down! As school had unofficially excluded my son due to his behaviour!

I wrote to LA asked for a change of placement, described how school could not meet needs.

DS is leaving mainstream to go to SS for autistic children. I don't know if we just got lucky (the ASD units were all as full as most of the special schools) but I hammered it home to them that unit wouldn't work because there is still emphasis on integrating child into mainstream classes and mainstream classes are the very thing that is totally not working. I also laid it on with a trowel that his mainstream school had tried everything anyone could possibly think of to help both behaviourally and academically. Actually, they've been pretty horrible, but it helps to knacker the LA argument that school could try more or another MS school could do more. DS also had unsuccessful assessments at 2 special schools. They were private schools approached by me, one for dyslexia, one for SALT but both with high proportion of ASD kids but not ASD schools as such. He was even rejected by a specifically for ASD school. When those schools reported that he couldn't even cope there I think it was good grist to the mill that it really had to be (another) ASD special school.

This is all really helpful thanks. In the basis of his EHCP a special school and a unit in mainstream have already said they couldn't meet his needs.

Shybutnotretiring that is my concern about units - there's no way DS will learn anything in a class if 30 kids. I think he'll end up spending all his time in the two rooms of whatever unit :-(

When my son was put into isolation inclusion and we were asked to find him another school we approached many schools in the area and they invariably asked for a quick rundown of what our ds was like so I would tell them the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, I didn't hold anything back. They all backed away saying that they couldn't meet his needs, the asd resource unit was the only one which said we may be able to meet his needs he meets the criteria but we don't have the space nor the time that he so obviously needs. Our LA talked to us about an asd specialist independent residential school in the neighboring LA, I said no because ds would not have coped with only coming home for weekends and holidays his self esteem was in the gutter, no confidence, he wanted to commit suicide

Eventually we were told that ds was no longer welcome at his school and the LA had to find him another one, the only commutable school that would take him was an independent special school and ds has been there ever since. It wasn't the ideal choice but it was that or nothing and they did have reservations as to whether they could meet his needs but I am happy to say that they were able to meet his identified needs, those that were unidentified have been helped by the school environment and their teaching method.

Now that all his needs have been identified and strategies and provision are in place I think progress will be easier to come by.

Looking back the asd resource unit would not have worked because of the expectation of joining the mainstream school for an increasing amount of time on a daily basis.

I couldn't see how the ASD unit would make much of a difference. Same playground/dinner hall/assembly etc problems, even bigger classes. I know they deliberately make the units low arousal but the two I saw just seemed a bit ghostly whereas the special schools generally had a lovely warm proper school atmosphere. I think the teachers in mainstream schools suggest the units because they know parents find it a shock to realise that their child needs to go to a special school and it's their way of soft-pedalling it to you. Feeds into what I'm sure would be the delusion that after a spell in the unit or alongside it your child could cope in mainstream.

My DD has just moved from MS and will be starting SS in September. I wouldn't say it broke down but I knew I wanted her in a new environment where she wasn't different. I just grabbed all evidence where I could and got the Senco to tell the LA they couldn't meet her needs. There was a lack of progress and she was becoming more and more isolated. I did a lot of research, went to a lot of schools and the reports from professionals and her 1:1 left no doubt that she just wasn't getting the support she needed in ms and that in fact rather than being included she was being excluded as she was unable to keep up both academically and socially.

The panel did suggest there was more her school could be doing and also suggested ASD units in borough but I ignored and pushed for parental preference.

I think the key really is knowing the Sen code of practice, getting the professionals on side and just advocate, advocate, advocate for your child.

It is not easy but I really think that the LA want people to give up through exhaustion.