Is this normal? And how can I stop it happening? (ehcp)

[elliejjtiny]

Ds5 is 10, year 6. He has autism, pica, emotional development delay (7 years behind chronological age). Gets high rate care, low rate mobility dla. Primary school are struggling with him. He gets elsa and has 1-1 support most of the time. At the beginning of the day I have to wait in the playground and I hand ds directly to the teacher and the reverse happens at the end of the day. When the children leave the classroom, ds is at the front of the line holding the teachers hand. Despite all this support, mostly from the school budget, there has been a number of times over the years where the head teacher has had to get a ladder out and retrieve ds from up a tree, and once from the school roof.

The LA refused to assess ds for an ehcp in April this year. School were livid and the decision was overturned at mediation. Everything was going really well and the LA put everything DS needed in section F. Full time 1-1, elsa, salt, ot etc. Really good. We went to the open day at secondary school and it was all good, ds loved it. The senco was really helpful, said she would love to have ds but he needs a lot of support, including a full time 1-1 for his own safety. The LA did the draft ehcp. All was good until the LA asked the secondary school if they would take ds with less than a quarter of the money needed to provide the things listed in section F. School replied with no, not unless the LA fund the place properly. Then the LA sent us the final ehcp with the secondary school named for September. I rang the LA and asked if they had agreed with the school about the money. The person from the LA said no, they didn't have to do that yet.

I was talking to someone I know who has dc with ehcp's and who also works in learning support and she said it's really common and the LA will probably budge a bit with the funding but not much. Then the school will limp along trying to care for ds until he inevitably gets excluded because of lack of supervision. Then another school will be offered more funding than the first school to take him.

Apart from all this being upsetting for ds, I don't want him to go to another school because he's been excluded. I want him to go to the school we chose, which is our catchment school and where 2 of his brothers go with the proper funding.

At the moment I have children in 3 different schools and it's extremely difficult. Next year 2 of the dc will move on and it will still be 3 schools. I can't do this with 4 schools, especially for no reason other than the LA trying to save money.

If the school is named in section I, they must admit.

The provision detailed, specified and quantified in F must be provided and can be enforced, via judicial review if necessary. Under section 42 of the Children and Families Act 2014, the LA is ultimately responsible for ensuring the provision is provided. This includes ensuring there is appropriate funding. EHCPs can be fully funded, but they will try to get away with providing as little as possible.

The way to ensure DS receives the support is to ensure F is watertight. No vague and woolly wording such as “access to”, “would benefit from”, “regular”, “up to”, “or equivalent”, “opportunities for”, “as appropriate”, “would be useful/helpful”, “such as”, “e.g.”, “as required”, “as advised”, “key adult(s)”, “small group”. If it has vague and woolly wording, it isn't worth the paper it is written on and is unenforceable. If that is the case, you should appeal.

Any school who excludes because of something that happens that is a result of a pupil’s disability when they weren’t receiving the provision in their EHCP would leave themselves open to challenge.

Thank you. His section F is all good. I went through it with a highlighter pen, checking all his needs were covered and no woolly wording.

After I stopped panicking yesterday I thought about a boy in ds2's year with undiagnosed SEN who caused all kinds of havoc but was never excluded, so hopefully they won't exclude Ds either. I will contact the senco when they go back to school and try to find out what's happening.

Am so sorry to hear about this, Op. Have you tried getting in touch with IPSEA? They might be able to offer advice....

If the provision is detailed, specified and quantified, it has to be provided and can be enforced. Try not to worry about a permanent exclusion. If the school excluded DS for behaviour related to his disability when he wasn’t receiving the SEP in the EHCP, you could challenge it.

Actually I think you are right to be concerned although it is not your job to be worrying about the finances. Ultimately placements for children with complex needs who are developmentally and academically very far behind their peers generally do not work or dont work for long in mainstream secondary schools. Is there a reason you have not considered a special school?

Thank you. I haven't heard of IPSEA, I'll get in touch with them.

I looked at some special needs schools but none of them seemed right for ds and they all seemed to be aimed at children with much higher needs than ds. Also we went to the open evening at the local mainstream secondary school and they seemed really positive about ds going there with the provision that was in his ehcp. They have a few children with similar needs to ds and they do all sorts with them like forest school and working on the allotment as well as the things like elsa and Lego therapy that he was getting at primary school.

We had similar issues when my son moved to junior school. The council are legally responsible for making sure your sons gets whatever is in section f. So if the school aren't providing it, you can write to the council in September and explain that your son isn't recieving the support on section f and give them a deadline for putting support in place. I think there are template letters on ipsea. Then when they don't do it, you can issue a legal letter called a "letter before action" which you can do yourself, there is definitely a template for this on ipsea. This tells the council they are breaking the law by refusing to provide the support named in section f and that you will be taking them to court. I emailed this directly to the legal team at the council and within a week then school had enough money for a 1 to 1 ta.

Also worth bearing in mind that it will cost the council 3 x more to send your son to special needs school that to give 1:1 in mainstream so not is in their interests to just cough up for the 1:1.