Son (age 6) has been excluded from school

[mummy2aaron]

I havent posted for ages but am at the end of my tether. ds has asd and we think adhd bbut are waiting for an ados to confirm, we were told before xmas this would take 9 weeks but now apparently they have no staff fully trained so could be 6 months. today i was informed he is excluded for 4 days for biting a teacher. i have constant phone calls to say he has put his foot down a grid - hit another child etc when it;s play/lunchtime and i know he is difficult but it has really upset me. school make all the right noises but have been promising to apply for a statement for a year now and still havent and i feel fobbed off. basically they just dont want him there and i dont know what to do, he has a brother already attending there and a sister due to start in september so he will be really upset to move and of course a change in routine will be more than difficult. ideally if we got a statement in place and the ados sorted we could make a better decision about his future but i just feel like i am banging my head against a brick wall. he is a clever little boy but social interaction is a major problem and he hits out when confused or frustrated. he doesnt sleep much which doesnt help - he has melatonin but it seems to have stopped working.

has anyone else had a similar problem with school.

HI Mummy, what a nightmare, I would advise that you apply for a statement yourself.
You don't need the school to do it for you & yopu have the right to appeal if you don't get a favourable result first time.
The fact that you ds has been having such a difficult time suggests he is either not getting the right level of support or its not the best school for him.
Hopefully this will all support your statement application.

thanks yes i will do that i was going to do it a couple of weeks ago but they promised me they were doing it but they just fob me off

Poor you! You don't have to wait for the school to apply for a statement though. You just write a letter yourself to the head of Special Educational Needs at the LEA (look up the correct name on the local council website) and say "I am writing to request a statutory assessment of my son for special educational needs under the 1996 Education Act." Then write a line or two about his problems and why you think he needs help at school, but mention that academically he is capable of being in mainstream, but has social issues. It sounds like he would benefit from a 1-to-1 (as my 6 year old ASD son has at mainstream, he couldn't cope without). But you need to get the statementing process rolling as, in the end, the school will fob you off as they ultimately report to the LEA (who don't want to give out statements as they cost ££££s!). Good luck!

the last time i mentioned it to school that it would not get him more help because he already gets a lot and the whole special needs budget for the year is already being spent on just him

What a load of BS. If they are spending their entire SEN budget on him, AND he is still not coping in school, then that means that they have NOT got sufficient funds to meet his needs. And if his needs cannot be met from the school budget alone, then that means he needs a statement.

So don't let them fob you off. They've already wasted a year of your child's life. Clearly his needs are not at the top of their agenda - he needs you to fight this battle for him.

ok thanks just drafting a letter now to the lea

Lots of sympathy to you. My DS who is now 9 and in Y5 with AS had a series of temporary exclusions from starting school right up until he was permanently excluded by the school at the end of last year 1 week before his draft statement was issued. We were consistantly fobbed off by the school about applying for a statment and had to do it ourselves for him at the end of Y4. If he had had a statment in place from when we first asked we would not be in the situation where DS is now slowly integrating into a new (fantastic) school, having been at home since November and I've had to virtually give up work to cope with it. His self esteem is rock bottom and we are seeing a psychologist every 2 weeks to try and bring him back from rock bottom and wanting to kill himself.

Take a look at the IPSEA and NAS websites as they have lots of help about your rights around exclusion and for template letters to the local authority requesting assessment. Sounds like the school just can't cope with him and are not looking at the right places to get support. Has your DS seen the Ed Psych and what were their recommendations? Does the local authority have an inclusion team? We have a local inclusion officer here who has been fantastic. Oh and contact Parent Partnership if you can - they can give you loads of advice about what to do and come with you to meetings to give you moral support.

Hope that this helps.

Hi mummytoaaron,

Feel for you both.

You have been given some excellent counsel to date and I hope that letter to the LEA requesting statutory assessment will be in the mail asap. Bloody school have certainly fobbed you off to date!.

This is taken from IPSEA's website on exclusions:-
www.ipsea.org.uk/exclusion-support-sheets.htm

You may find it useful.

i looked at that link attila - the head is maintaining that the exclusion is not due to his disability but it is - he wouldn;t have bit his teacher if he didn't have autism, he was frustrated and trying to tell her why he didn;t want to do the set work, she wasnt really listening or explaining just telling him he had to and that was it. if he had one to one support this wouldnt have happened.

wedgiesmum i will find out about the inclusion officer thanks.

xx

ok statement letter posted , inclusion officer spoken to, ed psych was contacted by the asd outreach team about it who are livid on our behalf. not been on to pp yet as had ds with me and a little upset about not going to school so will ring first thing as i want them at the meeting to let him back in on monday.

mummy2aaron

Good to read that the letter re the statement request is in the mail. Do note the date you sent in on your calendar and give the LEA six weeks to reply (also note that date on your calendar too).

Parent Partnership can work very closely with the LEA so are not always fully independent of them. Not saying don't use them but just bear the above in mind (some LEAs tow the party line). You may want to seek independent advice as well from someone like IPSEA, the NAS or ACE as the school may well be on shaky ground re discrimination. Infact I would do this as a matter of course.

I would see if you can get someone from the ASD outreach team to attend the meeting with yourself.

Good luck for Monday!.

They were very crafty in giving your son a 4 day exclusion because the governors and LEA do not have to be informed in such circumstances.

The Head must write immediately giving length and reason for exclusion.

Did that happen in your case?

The Head must inform the Governors only if
(a) an external exam would be missed or
(b) if the total days excluded in the term are more than 5.
The Governors must meet only if
(a) an external exam would be missed or
(b) the total days excluded in the term is over 5 and parents ask for a meeting.
Parents have the right to make 'written representations' which must be considered by governors and/or to attend the meeting.

The Head must inform the LEA only if exclusion means total days excluded in the term are more than 5 or if an external exam would be missed.
If exclusion is more than one day, school must set and mark work for child.

Longer term Mummy2aaron I would look for another hopefully more amenable school.

The head is trying to say that your child is being excluded for something not relating to ASD behaviour?! Yegods, is the head on the same planet as the rest of us?!

But they're playing a clever game by phoning you with each individual incident. What they'll say is that it is not 'reasonable' to include him, and that there is an immediate danger to others because of his behaviour. But you have to know your rights too - They have to take expert advice, they have to consult. If they have not taken the right expert advice, exclusion is illegal.

Yet...is this going to be the right school for son? He's already displaying extreme distress, and they're already trying to get rid of him I'd say. You might find that another school, no matter how much of a short term pain it is, might be a better option for him. Just a thought. But if a school is totally determined to get rid of a child, there's not a lot to stop them because they'll just make stuff up if they have to. Happened to our ds.

thanks for that i will get someone from the outreach team there.

i think they do make things up tbh there have been incidents reported to me where ds2 is the culprit in an incident and ds1 has actually witnessed the whole thing as he is a playleader and ds2 had nothing to do with it.

i think it is such a cooincidence too that this is the first time i wouldnt take the complaining call from the head - she rang me earlier in the day about an unrelated incident and i asked my mum to answer and say i wasnt in - my mum bless her was not convincing