ECHPs: Quality Assurance & Help 3rd February 2018 Dear All With the EHCP Transfer deadline just a few weeks away, its perhaps not surprising that we're sending an EHCP special. If you're in the Transfer process, please take the time to read our 12 points for quality assurance below. (next week, we'll cover nice Things to Do for families...)
A few terms and acronyms… However hard we try to explain jargonistic terms and acronyms in these newsletters, there’s always one that gets away! There’s more than most this week, so here’s a quick reference point at the outset: AfC Achieving for Children is a social enterprise company created by the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames and the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames to provide their children’s services. They are accountable to both Kingston and Richmond Councils as the two Local Authorities. DfE The Department for Education is responsible for children's services and education, including higher and further education policy, apprenticeships and wider skills in England. Local Authorities are accountable to the DfE. EHCP An Education, Health and Care (EHC) Plan is for children and young people aged up to 25 who need more support than is available through special educational needs support. EHCPs identify educational, health and social needs and set out the additional support to meet those needs. LO The Local Offer is a Local Authority's publication of all the provision “they expect to be available across education, health and social care for children and young people in their area who have SEN or are disabled, including those who do not have Education, Health and Care (EHC) plans.
Quality Assurance for EHCPs As you know, we continue to discuss Quality Assurance of draft EHCPs with AfC during the Transfer process. We’re pleased to report that AfC have agreed to review their quality criteria; on the basis of our feedback from families. That said, time is tight, and we know how difficult and protracted the transfer process can be – and it’s our children’s support that is at stake. We are including our current quality assurance recommendations – and with thanks to Ruils and SOSSEN for their additions.
Talk to Us If you’re having problems – or if you’re not - we’d like to hear from if you. It’s important to us that we accurately represent family’s experiences. T: 07469 746 145 E: sendfamilyvoices@outlook.com We can also point you in the direction of people who can help, and resources that you may find useful; you can find some resources in our newsletter dated 23 rd January W: www.sendfamilyvoices.org/news-2018
If you would like a copy of our Quality Assurance criteria, you can download a pdf from the Golden Binder page on our website. W: www.sendfamilyvoices.org/golden-binder
Your draft EHCP should not have any of the following issues…
Not Specific Enough 1. In Section F (Provision) and in professional reports that describe provision there should not be phrases such as “would benefit from”, “should have access to”, “regular”, “up to”, “as appropriate”, etc. Instead the type of provision, hours and frequency of support and level of expertise of the person providing it must be defined. If a programme is required, the Plan should state who (e.g. teacher, teaching assistant, therapist etc) is to draw up the programme, who is to provide it, what training and supervision they should have, and arrangements for monitoring and amendment. If your draft contains the phrases referred to or requires unspecified programmes, then the provision described is not specific and it will be difficult to know whether it is in fact being provided. Most importantly, you will not be able to enforce it if it is not. GOOD “Martin will have 2 hours per week of small group (maximum 6 pupils) literacy work provided by a higher level teaching assistant” BAD “Martin will be given access to a literacy programme that enables him to progress towards his literacy targets” In brief: The provision in Section F must be specific 2. Not including the hours of support for a child in section F. It is not sufficient to include a budgetary figure in the box after section F. The hours must be specified, as must the type of profile of the person (or people) providing the support. The plan should also specify what the person providing the support is doing (just writing “1:1 support” is also not helpful). Some plans do not have this included at the moment even where it is clearly specified in the statement In brief: The exact number of hours of support in Section F must be specified 3. Not specifying who will deliver the provision, including the expertise required. Section F should state who or what type of person, including their qualification, should be delivering the provision (in the “who” column or in the description of the provision). The code of practice clearly states that the expertise of the person delivering the provision should be specified. GOOD: A Health and Care Professionals Council accredited and qualified Occupational Therapist (OT) with expertise in sensory issues BAD: OT will be provided. In brief: The person and/or service delivering the provision (ie support, therapies etc) must be named 4. Use of the title “Strategies to achieve Outcomes”, which has been appearing in drafts under the Section F. Section F already has a title, which is “Provision to Meet Needs”. “Strategies to achieve outcomes” suggests that it is appropriate to write more general statements – rather than provide detailed, specific quantified provision (as required by the Code of Practice). This phrase should not appear as it is potentially misleading about what needs to be written in this section.
In brief: The title Provision to Meet Needs fits the Code of Practice; it’s clear and specific. 5. Badly written Outcomes. An outcome is the benefit or difference made by the provision in F, G and H. Outcomes should be specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time bound. The process should be that needs are formulated, then provision to meet each and every need; outcomes should only be formulated at that point and should focus on what all concerned hope to achieve as a result of giving the child the support required. In far too many cases, vague and generic outcomes are drafted first, then equally vague provision is forced unnaturally into boxes to “fit” the outcomes, rather than being drafted in order to meet needs. GOOD: [Provision = is the 1:1 reading support, twice a week – which means that the outcome is:] John will be able to read level 4 books, by the end of summer term. BAD: John will learn to read the same books as his friends In brief: Outcomes should be specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time bound.
Not including All Provision and Advice 6. Not including provision that is defined in the statement. Unless there is a professional report which supersedes the statement and explicitly states that the provision is no longer needed, any provision that is included in the statement must be carried over into the EHCP. In brief: Provision that is included in the statement, must be carried over to the EHCP 7. Not including provision specified in professional reports or arbitrarily changing the frequency or duration specified without explaining why the advice has not been taken. All provision that is specified in professional reports requested by the SEN team should be included as defined. If there are changes made to the provision defined the Code or Practice requires AfC to specify why. There needs to be a good reason related to the child’s needs: the fact that the provision required is expensive, for example, is not a good reason. In brief: All provision that is specified in professional reports requested by the SEN team must be included as described by the professional report defined. 8. Ignoring advice submitted from private therapists or other professionals. Where parents choose to submit advice from private professionals (i.e. they commission the advice themselves rather than it being requested by AfC) the advice of these professionals must be considered. If the advice relating to needs and provision is disregarded, then AfC should say why they have departed from advice given by these professionals. Again, they are not entitled to ignore such advice merely because the support recommended is more costly, or more extensive and specific, than that suggested in LA reports, or because it comes from reports provided by parents. In brief: Private advice must be considered and AfC must state why they disregard it (if they do) 9. Not defining provision to meet all needs. The code of practice clearly states that there must be provision defined for every
need. If you review the Provision (section F) and find that there are needs defined in Section B that do not have provision, then this should be rectified. If the needs (in Section B) have not been specified, then you will not have the needs provided for (provision). In brief: Section B (needs) should be exhaustive – not a summary
Confusion about Equipment and Therapies 10. Putting all equipment and physio provision in section G. Decisions on whether specialist equipment (walkers/standing frames/hoisting/toileting equipment) as well as Physio, OT and Speech and Language provision are “Educational Provision – Section F” must be decided on an individual basis. If the equipment or provision “educates or trains” the child or young person then it must be included in Section F of the plan even if it is delivered by a health professional. Likewise, if medical provision is required because otherwise the child’s disability may prevent or hinder them from accessing or making use of educational facilities (e.g mobility aids, provision for epilepsy, diabetes, incontinence, allergies etc), it should be in section F. In brief: Equipment or provision that ‘educates or train, or allows education to be accessed’ the child or young person must be included in Section F
Confusion about Who is Doing What and By When 11. Not discussing/agreeing with the family or young person which professional advice needs to be obtained in order to draft the plan, or not requesting advice from key professionals (e.g. OT / SaLT). Many families that we talk to seem to be utterly bemused about which information is being requested, who is writing it and why. We strongly recommend that the case worker agrees in writing (by email if possible), with the parents or young person, a list of all the individuals who will be asked to provide reports and who will be contacting them to ask for that advice. The transfer meeting or call is supposed to cover this – but it doesn’t always seem to happen. The Code of Practice has very clear guidelines on which advice must be sought, i.e advice and information from: • You • Medical Advice • An Educational Psychologist. • Social Services. • If relevant, specialist in visual or hearing impairment. • Anyone else they think appropriate. • Anyone you reasonably request they seek advice from. • For pupils in Year 9 and above, advice on preparation for adulthood and independent living. Advice which may be appropriate and/or which parents may reasonably request includes advice from, for instance, speech and language and occupational therapy services and CAMHS if there are indications that your child has communication, motor or sensory problems, or difficulties such as anxiety, depression, anorexia and school refusal. AfC must obtain such advice irrespective of whether or not your child is already known to the relevant service; if they cannot arrange it in time via NHS sources, they must source it from independent providers.
However, they need not obtain such advice if you and they agree that current information is suitable and adequate to enable all your child’s difficulties to be fully described in any EHC Plan, and to ensure that detailed and specific provision for those difficulties can be set out in the Plan. In brief: The SEN Team must agree with the family (ideally in writing) which professionals they will ask for reports. 12. Parents being told that the draft must be issued by a date in March (in order to meet the DofE deadline at the end of March). Parents should be issued a draft plan once all the necessary advice has been obtained and the parent/young person’s views have been adequately taken into account. The DfE has made clear that no child or young person will lose support on 1st April as a result of the deadline. The important thing is the quality of the plan, not the deadline. If parents feel that the draft plan is not adequate then they may request a meeting with their case worker within the 15 day deadline – and normally an extension will be granted and a meeting arranged.
Year 9 and above – updated guidance Parents of children in years 9 or 10 and above who are transferring to an EHCP will be aware that the EHCP template looks slightly different to the template for children below year 10. The reason for this is that the Code of Practice requires that from year 9 onward, reviews must have a focus on Preparing for Adulthood (PfA). Richmond and Kingston have chosen to create a form that reflects the Preparing for Adulthood categories for sections B, E and F. This has caused some confusion and difficulty for some schools and parents. So… on January 11th a meeting was held between a group of parents, the Post-16 SEN Team and Linda Jordan (from the DfE’s PfA pathfinder group) to discuss some guidelines that could help to clarify things. The draft guidance is on our website
– once it is agreed by the EHCP Process Governance group, it will be formalised and placed on the Local Offer. We suggest that if your child is in year 9 or above and moving to an EHCP it would be helpful to read the draft guidance – you will find it by scrolling down the page below: W: http://www.sendfamilyvoices.org/golden-binder/ If you experience problems with using the draft form, please let us know and we will try to work with AfC to find a solution. E: penny@sendfamilyvoices.org
Council for Disabled Children The Council for Disabled Children’s latest digest gives you a complete national overview for the past few months. The link to the pdf is below and, in keeping with our EHCP theme, here are a couple of highlights you may find particularly useful: Page 10 - Steve Broach's case law update (law in the UK is tested in the courts – so case law sets precedents) Page 22 - spotlights the CDC's new Best Practice Examples / Resources for EHCPs - published 11th Dec'17. https://councilfordisabledchildren.org.uk/sites/default/files/field/attachemnt/Winter%20Diges t%202018%20final5.pdf
From Special Needs Jungle Writing parental views - Nancy Gedge – 22nd January 2018 “One of the things I get asked regularly, in my capacity of mother of an older child with Down’s syndrome, is how to write the parental statement part of the EHCP, either as part of the initial assessment or annual review. - I’ve written a fair few of them and this column is an explanation of how I do it. It’s not intended to be the definitive guide, just what has worked for me.” https://www.specialneedsjungle.com/writing-ehcp-parental-statement/
DfE deadlines and support - Tania Tirraoro – 24th January 2018 “Following Matt's post last week about Transfer Deadlines and zombie statements, we got in touch with the Department for Education and posed a few questions that we thought you'd like the answers to and they have replied, so I'm sharing everything with you today. Sharing is caring, after all.” https://www.specialneedsjungle.com/dfe-ehcp-transfer-deadline-all-change-national-sendsupport-services/ As ever, if you have any queries at all, please ask and we'll always do our best to find an answer. With best wishes, Romany (for Richmond) and Caroline North (for Kingston) Phone: 07469 746 145 www.sendfamilyvoices.org