Giving all children the opportunity to succeed
Draft June 2005
C:\DOCUME~1\User\LOCALS~1\Temp\SEN & inclusion policy.doc1
1.Introduction
“All children have the right to a good education and the opportunity to fulfil their potential. All teachers should expect to teach children with special educational needs (SEN) and all schools should play their part in educating children from their local community, whatever their background or ability. We must reflect this in the way we train our teachers, in the way we fund our schools and the way we judge their achievements”
Removing Barriers to Achievement (DfES, 2004)
This important quote from the introduction of the national strategy for special educational needs sets a clear backdrop to our new SEN and Inclusion Strategy.
We believe schools arecrucial in the development of effective inclusive practice and enabling all children and young people to participate and feel valued as part of their community.
However, inclusion is everyone’s business and this strategy has been developed as a response both to national expectations and to feedback from a range of local stakeholders about the key issues that they feel we need to address in Hertfordshire.
We want to build on the good practice that is already developing and promote greater consistency across the county.
This document sets out:
- the national and local context for the strategy
- the four key development areas identified for us to take forward
- a clear set of actions to take forward the components of the strategy.
2.National Context
SEN and Disability
Important legislation and guidance specifically related to special educational needs and inclusion has been introduced in recent years.
- The SEN and Disability Act (SENDA, 2001) provides a revised statutory framework for inclusion. It strengthens the right of children with SEN and disabilities to be educated in mainstream schools and for schools to make reasonable adjustments to ensure children with these needs are not disadvantaged.
- The revised SEN Code of Practice, which took effect in 2002, reflected the new rights and duties introduced by SENDA. The five principles of the code are:
-that children with SEN should have their needs met
-that their needs will normally be met in mainstream schools
-that the views of children should be sought and taken into account
-that parents have a vital role to play in supporting their child’s education
-that children with SEN should be offered full access to a broad, balanced and relevant curriculum in the foundation stage and later years.
- The Audit Commission report ‘Special Educational Needs – A Mainstream Issue’, 2002, highlighted a number of continuing challenges in the system and inconsistencies in provision. The report made recommendations about developing mainstream practice to meet SEN.
- An Audit Commission Report in 2003 also reported variable practice in relation to support for children with disabilities and their families
- The Ofsted inspection of schools now places a greater emphasis on the inclusion of all groups of pupils, including those with SEN and disability. An Ofsted report in 2004 ‘Special Educational Need and Disability: Towards Inclusive Schools’ found that there was a growing awareness of the benefits of inclusion and evidence of some improvements in practice. However, effective practice in mainstream schools for pupils with SEN was found to be patchy and the report recommended the ability of mainstream schools to work with a diverse range of needs should be enhanced, closer links between mainstream and special schools were needed, and there should be a greater focus on monitoring and evaluation.
- Our strategy had been developed to take Hertfordshire in the direction of the aims of the government’s strategy for SEN, ‘Removing Barriers to Achievement’, 2004. Thisambitious national programme further reinforces the drive for greater inclusion and improving the outcomes for children with SEN. It sets out a framework around four themes:
-early intervention
-removing barriers to learning
-raising expectations and achievement
-delivering improvements in partnership.
A key focus for us is to widenopportunities for children to learn successfully in mainstream schools by developing their capacity, skills and confidence to meet the needs of children with SEN
The national SEN strategy also confirms an important but changing role for special schools, as proposed in the earlier report of the Special Schools’ Working Group (2003). Children with less significant needs, including moderate learning difficulties and less severe behaviour difficulties, will have their needs met in mainstream schools. Our special schools will needto increasingly cater for children with the most severe and complex needs and become more outward-looking, working in collaboration to support provision within mainstream schools.
‘Removing Barriers’ also expects authorities to delegate more SEN resources to support early intervention and the development of inclusive practice within mainstream schools and we have already started upon a review of ourcurrent arrangements to investigate the options for change.
- Also relevant to our developments is the National Service Framework 2004 which provides a long-term plan for the integration of health and social care services. Standard 8 applies specifically to children with disabilities and aims to enable them to “receive coordinated, high quality child and family-centred services which are based on assessed needs (and) which promote social inclusion”.
- The national report ‘Improving Life Chances of Disabled People’ 2005 also has a focus on improving support and opportunities for people with disabilities and their families.
The Broader Context
The national vision for SEN and disabilities sits within the context of the broader reform of children’s services, as set out in Every Child Matters (2003) and The Children Act (2004). Five key outcomes are identified for all children, including those with special or additional needs.
-being healthy
-staying safe
-enjoying and achieving
-making a positive contribution
-achieving economic well-being.
The implementation of the Every Child Matters – Change for Children programme requires education, social care and health services to be bought together through children’s trust arrangements, with a focus on multi-agency working and a common assessment framework. The emphasis is on the child at the centre with services organised around his or her needs.
The Five Year Strategy creates a new relationship with schools, encouraging schools to collaborate closely together and focus on improved outcomes for all children. There is also an emphasis on personalisation – making teaching and learning more responsive to individual children and providing services in line with need.
National Themes
A number of key themes can therefore be seen throughout recent national strategies, including:
-prevention and early intervention
-inclusion
-integration of services
-common assessment and information sharing
-partnership arrangements
-focus on shared outcomes
-new roles and ways of working.
3.Local Context
We believe a key starting point for raising achievement and increasing inclusion for all is effective school leadership and management. In Ofsted inspections since September 2003 over two thirds of Hertfordshire schools were judged as having good or better inclusive practice, with 13 schools deemed as having excellent practice. We therefore have considerable good practice to build upon.
The vast majority of children with SEN in Hertfordshire are educated in their local mainstream schools through differentiated teaching and learning. There are 14.2% of children in the county whose needs have been identified at School Action/Action Plus or through a statement. This is just below the national average, although it should be noted there are no agreed criteria nationally for the level of need that should be identified.
The work of Hertfordshire schools in meeting special and additional needs is assisted by a range of specialist services and provision. Advisory and support services provide input in relation to whole school issues as well as meeting individual needs. Support arrangements are put in place for children with significant and/or low incidence needs and a small proportion of these children have statements. The total number of Hertfordshire statements in 2004 was 4262 and has been relatively stable over the past four years. 520 new statutory assessments were carried out during last year.
The percentage of the school population in Hertfordshire with a statement is below the national average, partly explained by the introduction of Earmarked Pupil Funding (EPF) five years ago. This is an individual pupil allocation available where certain criteria are met at School Action Plus. When the numbers of children with statements and EPF are taken together the proportion is in line with the national average for statements of 3%.
In its continuum of provision, Hertfordshire has enhanced resource bases in mainstream schools for different types of need and a range of special schools catering for learning difficulties, including autism, emotional and behavioural difficulties, physical and neurological impairment and hearing impairment.
Although the majority of our schools have received positive judgements by Ofsted as regards inclusive practice, the percentage of pupils with a new statement placed in a mainstream school is lower than average. 64% of Hertfordshire children with statements made for the first time, are placed in mainstream compared to the national average of 74%. The regional average is 78% and the average of our statistical neighbouring authorities is 72%.
The overall proportion of Hertfordshire children placed in special schools is 1.4%, slightly higher than the national average of 1.2%. The regional average is 1.1% and our statistical neighbours’ average is 1.3%.
Special schools have a major contribution to make in an inclusive framework. They will provide directly for increasingly complex needs and share their expertise to build capacity in mainstream schools. A review of Hertfordshire special school provision was concluded in July 2004 and recommended some developments to be taken forward under the SEN and Inclusion Strategy. These included:
-reviewing the developing the role of special schools to work with mainstream schools in clusters or federations
-planning to use the opportunities provided by the Building Schools for the Future initiative to develop the pattern of provision for children with learning difficulties
-increasing capacity to meet the needs of children with severe autism
-developing local capacity through extended day/respite provision to enable more children to have their needs met in-county
-reviewing and developing the funding arrangements for special schools.
Although we have a wide range of specialist provision, the proportion of children with statements attending non-maintained and independent special schools and other independent schools is 5.1%, compared to the national average of 4.5%. There are 195 Hertfordshire children with statements educated in specialist provision outside of the county, some of whom have significant social care or health needs. There is national concern about the lack of contact some children in out of authority placements have with their parents, about the quality of some provision, about monitoring arrangements and the high cost of such placements. In Hertfordshire the average annual cost of an out-county placement is approximately £60,000 but some placements can cost in excess of£200,000. We want to develop Hertfordshire provision to enable more children to have their needs met within their local community wherever possible.
4.Underlying Principles
A Hertfordshire inclusion working party produced an outline strategy paper that was agreed by members and introduced to headteachers in autumn 2003. This established the purpose and underlying principles of our strategy and these are set out below.
Our overarching aim is to raise school standards and children’s achievements and ensure that young people can lead useful lives in the community after leaving school. We want to ensure that all children, including those with SEN, get the right support at the right time and in the right way so they develop to their full potential and participate as much as possible in the life of their local community. This requires each child to be involved in a range of appropriate educational and social experiences.
We believe that:
- every child is entitled to a high quality education which is appropriate for her or his individual needs.
- schools and the Local Authority have a shared responsibility for providing for the needs of all Hertfordshire children.
- there should be a continuum of provision matched to the needs of individual children with as many as possible experiencing mainstream settings.
- there should be clarity of roles and accountabilities with a focus on the needs of the child.
- there should be transparency of information, funding and decision making.
- assessments should be undertaken in a timely manner and reflect the needs of the child as a whole.
- more preventative approaches should be developed wherever possible.
- children and parents will have a say in the decisions about their education.
- schools should work together in collaborative groups to share good practice and make effective use of resources with the child at the centre.
- children and adults should be encouraged to see learning as a life-long process, which continues beyond school.
- collaborative approaches should be developed and maintained with other agencies and voluntary organisations.
5.Stakeholder Involvement
In March 2004 the CSF Board approved the establishment of a task group with the aim of developing a detailed plan of activities to take our SEN and Inclusion Strategy forward and to ensure the integration of developments with the new School Effectiveness Strategy.
During the summer term the task group, chaired by the Deputy Director (Learning and School Effectiveness), identified a set of themes for the strategy to address. In doing so, the group took particular note of the expectations in the government’s SEN Strategy ‘Removing Barriers’ as well as the key local issues for us in Hertfordshire.
Four key themes were identified:
1.School Effectiveness and Inclusion
We believe this to be important because an inclusive school is an effective school. The expertise gained by schools in meeting the needs of children with special and additional needs will lead to practices that enhance teaching and learning for all and improve school performance. All staff and pupils will benefit from the development of inclusive practice.
2.Training and Support
It is vital that everyone involved in working with children and young people feel able to meet an increasingdiversity of need. We know that it is very important for parents and carers that they feel their child’s needs are understood and that school staff feel committed and confident to meet them. We believe that a range of professional development and training opportunities should be available and that these should be more coordinated than they have been. We also believe that we need to develop better and sustainable ways of sharing expertise between practitioners.
3.Resourcing
Resources for SEN need to be used effectively and distributed as fairly as possible based on need. We also want to make sure that the way the authority allocates resources supports the development of effective practice in schools. There are doubts about whether the current system does this as well as it could. We want to consider increased delegation of funds to schools but need to make sure that we do this in a way that ensures children with SEN have their needs met and that there is a really robust framework of expectations, accountability and monitoring that everyone understands.
4.Meeting Needs Locally
It is a very strong principle of CSF that all children and young people should be enabled to feel part of their local community. We want more children to be able to be successfully educated in a local school and for parents to have confidence in this provision. We think that there is much to be gained for schoolstaff, children and their families from schools working together in an area to meet needs locally and share expertise and resources.
It is important that these themes are seen as interlinked in the strategy. The Inclusion Task Group sought the views of stakeholders through a workshop held in the Autumn 2004. This was attended by approximately 60 participants, including headteachers, special educational needs coordinators, governors, parents, voluntary organisations, health service staff and a range of staff across CSF.
The purpose of this event was to:
-set out the national expectations and local context
-share the work of the Inclusion Task Group
-ask stakeholders whether the identified themes broadly represented the key issues as they saw them in Hertfordshire
-begin to identify a range of solutions to these issues.
The feedback from participants at the workshop was overwhelmingly positive. Stakeholders felt their views were valued and almost every participant expressed a willingness to be involved in follow-up activities and development work. There was support for an increased focus on SEN and inclusion issues and agreement that the four themes represented the key development areas.
The outcomes of the workshop were analysed and a small number of stakeholders, including parents, were invited to join the Inclusion Task Group in a subsequent working sessions in December 2004 and May 2004 to develop action plans.
6.Key Themes and Priorities
The themes, the key issues raised by stakeholders, and the priorities for us to develop are set out below. Action plans for each theme are attached in Appendix 1.
THEME 1: SCHOOL EFFECTIVENESS AND INCLUSION
AimTo ensure that the framework for evaluating school effectiveness reflects SEN and Inclusion as key to raising standards for all.
Summary of Stakeholder Feedback and Key Issues
There is some very good practice in Hertfordshire schools but it is not consistent. There is a lack of clarity about what is expected of schools in relation to SEN and inclusion and insufficient emphasis on reporting and celebrating the broader achievements of children with SEN.