Agenda item

Nick Lee, Head of Access and Learning, and John Dexter, Education Director, gave a presentation on SEND (special educational needs and disabilities) in Nottingham City updating the Committee on the work done this year. They highlighted the following points:

(a)  14% of young people in Nottingham City have SEND. This is slightly above the national average. Most of these young people are in mainstream school;

(b)  Specialist provision is provided for those with an Education, Health and Care Plan and there is a growing demand for plans for those children not previously identified as needing one;

(c)  There is specialist support in place for schools at both a pupil level and a strategic level to help identify the most appropriate interventions;

(d)  There are a number of specialist provisions in Nottingham City for children and young people with SEND, of these 3 are ranked outstanding. There are two that currently require improvement and this is a focus of a particular work stream;

(e)  A large proportion of the young people who are over 16 with SEND in Nottingham are in further education, training or employment. There are a number of significant changes occurring in and around Nottingham regarding further education so this will be monitored;

(f)  One of the major focuses is around exclusion and SEND. There are concerns nationwide that a high proportion of SEND young people are excluded;

(g)  In Nottingham City the proportion of SEND young people excluded from primary school is favourably comparable to the national average, however the proportion of secondary school exclusions is more in line with the national average;

(h)  Improvements have been made in identifying children and young people with SEND and primary schools are particularly good at providing good packages of support in place. However more work needs to be done around identification as many young people entering referral units and alternative provision are found to have SEND;

(i)  There are 5 areas of priority focus going forward:

·  Improvement of inclusion provision

·  Development of specialist provision

·  Transition to secondary

·  Co-production with young people and families

·  Multiple agency support to schools

(j)  The Accountability Board is responsible for drive and direction of strategic priorities of SEND provision. Membership is mixed with representation from a number of different services;

Following questions and discussion from the Committee the following points were made:

(k)  Personal allowance budget is put into a controlled account which allows families to choose the additional personal care services which will most benefit their child. These funds are monitored by Disability Services to ensure that they are spent appropriately. Unspent money comes back to the council to be reallocated;

(l)  Transition to secondary school is a very important time, it is perhaps more difficult for young people with SEND.  There are a number of different models run across the range of academies to try and ease the transition. Special educational needs coordinators are spending a lot of time with pupils focusing on transition, but secondary schools have a large number of schools they intake from and this makes focusing on SEND more challenging;

(m)  The authority works closely with the Regional Schools Commissioner to ensure that the office is aware of exclusion data;

RESOLVED to:

(1)  thank  Nick Lee and John Dexter for their attendance and to note the content of their presentation;

(2)  review progress in improving support for children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities, including the work of the Accountability Board, in one year’s time; and

(3)  consider the findings of the expected CQC/ Ofsted Local Area Inspection of provision for children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities, and the response to those findings.