Filed under: Special Needs Education | Tags: Coalition, coalition cuts, disability, education, education cuts, Education Minister, graduated response, Green Paper, Green Paper SEN and Disability consultation process, Guerrilla Mum, improved teaching, Michael Gove, pastoral care, Sarah Teather, school action, school action plus, SEN, sharing best practice, Special Educational Needs, statement of special educational needs
The green paper for SEN and disability states that those children who currently have a statement, less than 3% of children with SEN, will have an education, health and care plan (EHCP) under the new system. There are also plans to improve achievement for children who are disadvantaged through pastoral care. So far, however, there are only very vague indications about how SEN will be provided for in children who fall into neither of the above categories and have less severe SEN. There will be a lot of children in this lower level category of need! Many of these children will have very real SEN requiring specialist support.
I have commented regularly about the limp and woolly provision currently available to unstatemented children with SEN through the school action and school action plus categories of the graduated response process of our current system for meeting SEN. Yet the new system promises to scrap these classifications replacing them with a new tier of provision. Children will be ‘lumped together’ in this category, with some receiving pastoral care because they are disadvantaged, and others receiving support for SEN through ‘better teaching’ and schools sharing best practice. Also, the voluntary sector will be brought in to carry out so far unspecified roles. Remember, this new system will be implemented by health and education services that have undergone savage cuts and will draw heavily on untrained support from the voluntary sector. I don’t believe it is possible to improve provision for children with SEN and disabilities by cutting specialist services and replacing these with an untrained voluntary sector.
I can see a lot of children who need specialist intervention for their SEN receiving little more than pastoral support if the school has nothing else to offer, leading to misery and failure for thousands of children. How do I know? This is exactly what happened to my son under the deeply flawed but infinitely more robust graduated response of our current system.
The lack of clarity surrounding this is simply not good enough. Everyone has the opportunity to influence these policies by taking the opportunity to make representations to the consultation, and write to their MP to ask how, in detail will the plans be funded and implemented.
Filed under: Education and the new government | Tags: accountability, Education Minister, Emperor's New Clothes, Green Paper, Guerrilla Dad, Holding the government to account, SEN, Transparency, Transparency website
Dear Dave (may I call you Dave – you may call me Grrrr it’s short for Guerrilla Mum)
Well, gosh! Thank you so much for the new Transparency Website. I opened it this morning at the section I am interested in – number 6: Improve support for children, young people and families, focussing on the most disadvantaged. Here is the link. http://transparency.number10.gov.uk/transparency/srp/view-srp/37/46. Incidentally Dave why is this number issue number 6 and not number 1? Number 2 or 3 would be better…
It’s fair to say that by the time I had got to 6.1 ‘Review and reform provision for children with special educational needs, disability and mental health needs’ I was fairly bursting with anticipation. Opening the next section 6.1.i. ‘Develop and publish a Green Paper on special educational needs and disabilities’, I couldn’t wait for the update on status, as not only did I comment on the Green paper, I spent a lot of time encouraging others to do so. I knew you would appreciate that. So I clicked, with baited breath.
In Progress? I’ll write it again. In Progress? I haven’t worked in public service recently but the Guerrilla Dad who has, and has written a few business plans in his time, reliably informs me that if anybody arrived at a meeting with an update of a plan which said ‘ In Progress…’ everybody knew that it meant one of 3 things …
1. Ooh I haven’t done this yet, there are so many more important things to do and I haven’t really had time to think about this.
2. I know this isn’t on the important part of the agenda and only gets asked about at the end of the meeting.
3. Oh! So that’s why my boss sent me to this meeting …….(note to self consider alternative career development).
Guerrilla Dad also said that if he had used any of these excuses in meetings he would have got his butt kicked soundly, and witnessed this happening to others.
So Dave, back to Transparency. This is proof conclusive that your government thinks we are stupid and able to be fobbed off with vague performance statements and unsatisfactory updates. You have made one thing very clear though, Free Schools (allegedly in great demand but actually only about 30 groups have come forward) are right at the top of the agenda.
One fifth of pupils in Britain will have Special Educational Needs (SEN). One in a hundred will have an Autistic Spectrum Condition. Other children will have a wide variety of other SEN or disabilities. Transparently the government does not care about these children and I am angry and upset. It is offensive to me that you think this is in any way satisfactory. How does this make you accountable? Where is the Accountability button? How do we hold this government and the Education Minister to account? Transparency? Frankly Dave we can see right through this, and I’ve changed my mind it’s MRS Grrrr to you!
Filed under: Education and the new government | Tags: 51%, Academies, chid benefit, Coalition, coalition cuts, Conservatives, deception, Deputy Prime Minister, disadvantaged, Education Minister, equality, equitable, fair, fixed election term, Free Schools, Michael Gove, Special Educational Needs, spin, The Guardian, tuition fees, vote of no confidence
There has been a lot of talk about how election pledges have been broken on tuition fees and on child benefit. Lots of column inches, hours of radio and television and bucket loads of spin. It was hard to watch TV, listen to the radio or read a paper without seeing the DPM telling of his angst and regret.
Almost unnoticed except for a small article in The Guardian, see it here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2010/oct/24/michael-gove-pupil-premium – was the news that the Minister of Education had revealed that the funding for the ‘Pupil Premium’ was not in fact ‘new money’ but would largely come out of other schools funding . Why is this important? It’s important because the Prime Minister, the Deputy Prime Minister and the Education Minister have all previously said that it would come from outside the Education budget. Was it a mistake, sophistry or downright deception? I suppose we will never know.
What I do know is that through skilful spin it has not emerged as a big issue and was not widely reported. Because of this the government’s media monitors/advisers will clap themselves on the back and say that nobody is making a fuss about this so you can go ahead and push on and cut more money from budgets for poor or disadvantaged pupils . It’s cynical, nasty and demonstrates their true colours.
You can’t do anything about the parliament at the moment because the first thing the government did was to fix the election term and make 51% the margin for a vote of no confidence. You can however influence them by campaigning in the media. I admire the skill of the Conservative spin doctors because they have made the Liberal members of the cabinet take most of the heat. They do have a weakness though in that we have seen the Prime Minister have some spectacular wobbles when public opinion goes very much against them eg. Child Benefit.
If we want a society in which we look after the vulnerable and believe in an equitable (not ‘FAIR’ ) education system we need to say so now. We need coverage in the papers, radio and on TV and then we can make this happen. I haven’t seen any money being taken from Free Schools and Academies for the few, when there are so many schools which need appropriate funding. Free Schools are not about education they are about social selection and elitism. Don’t believe me, take a trip to the Conservative Home website article on admissions policy and see what will come if we don’t object now.
I don’t believe that the case for these cuts in education has been proved. The Conservative spin campaign is masking the nasty ideology behind the re-engineering of our education system into a social and educational elitist organisation paid for by our money. The next thing to ‘go’ (ie change irrevocably) will be the admissions code. Remember you saw it here first.
Filed under: Education and the new government, Special Needs Education | Tags: Coalition, coalition cuts, disability, education, education cuts, Education Minister, equality, Green Paper, Michael Gove, Minister of State for Children and Families, Sarah Teather, SEN, Special Educational Needs, spin
We’re going to have to stop meeting like this, me and top policiticans… There I was – again – in bed, minding my own business, when the radio came on and I heard another government announcement about Education and spending. This time it was not the Education Minister or reporting on OFSTED, it was the Deputy Prime Minister announcing a “fairness premium” worth £7bn for children who are disadvantaged or deprived.
I think this is an excellent policy, which is long overdue, although it could be seen by some as an extension of Sure Start which is now under threat by the DfE.
BUT, the DPM has not extended what seems to be an excellent principle to children with special educational needs (SEN), disability, or those in deprived areas whose schools are falling down around them. Nor did he say how this will be paid for. It also seems a bit like making policy on the hoof. The Green Paper consultation on SEN and disability closes today, and I would certainly have made more mention of early years provision for SEN and disabled children and early diagnosis had I known this was on the cards. Why have the Education Minister or the Minister for Children not mentioned it? Perhaps they did not know about it, and this is another example of an Instant Policy, this time in the face of public anger about university tuition fees. We were ‘due’ some good news to keep some of the Public on board.
Don’t get me wrong, I am in favour of this, but I can’t help feeling manipulated by a cynical government. This policy needs to be properly thought out, properly funded with long term prospects. It needs to apply to any child who may be disadvantaged so that when they start school they can then all have the same opportunity to learn. It is also essential that this applies throughout their life at school. It would be worse to give to preschool and primary school children extra support and and then take it away later. (I feel a bit like that about what might happen after the Green Paper).
Fairness is the new coalition buzz word. It usually means they are going to be fair to one particular group, at the great expense of another. The public can’t object because to do so would be ‘unfair’. It feels to me that children at school are being split along Victorian lines of ‘the deserving poor’ and the ‘undeserving poor’. Anyone who falls into the perception of ‘undeserving’ be you a public servant or SEN child or benefit claimant is in trouble because we are told that there is no money for them.
And THAT’S not fair.
Filed under: Education and the new government | Tags: 1996 Education Act, Advocacy, Benefits Cheats, Big Yellow Taxi, Coalition, coalition cuts, Conservative conference, disability, education, Education Minister, Green Paper, media, media headlines, Michael Gove, Minister of State for Children and Families, Ofsted, Saba Salman, Sarah Teather, SEN, Special Educational Needs, Spending Review, spin, statement of special educational needs, x factor
‘… Don’t it always seem to go
That you don’t know what you’ve got
Till it’s gone
They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot…’
Big Yellow Taxi, Joni Mitchell
I was busy cleaning my windows the other day and I found myself singing the words to ‘Big Yellow Taxi’. These days the issue of Special Educational Needs (SEN) education is never far from my mind and I moved quickly on to considering the ‘Green Paper: Children And Young People With Special Educational Needs And Disabilities – Call For Views’. This was launched in September by Sarah Teather, Minister of State for Children and Families. She has asked for the views of everyone with an interest in the needs of children in England with special educational needs (SEN) or disabilities and she says that views and perspectives will be considered in drafting a Green Paper on SEN and disability to be published in the autumn. We have until 15th October 2010 to contribute.
You can respond online on the Dept for Education website. Here is the link.
I have been thinking about this a lot, not only of the possible positive outcomes of such a Green Paper, but also what children with SEN might lose as a result of it. I am still writing my response. I have the document tucked away on my desktop and keep going back to it as things come to me. I hope I can make a small difference. If more of us reply then we will make a slightly bigger difference. If lots of us reply, then the impact will be yet greater, and so on.
Based on my feelings and views about the behaviour of the Coalition government since it came to power, and how it has dealt with Education issues, I find it difficult to decide whether the Green Paper is in fact a genuine call for views. I have watched the Coalition rush through Parliament the wildly ill thought out and controversial Academies Bill to expedite the Tory vision for Education for all. They did it in the face of some stiff opposition from the general Public, the Labour Party and some Liberal Democrats. The Minister for Education has expressed reservations about the quality of trainee teachers, but then veers off at a tangent, saying that Free Schools might not have to employ fully qualified teachers. Extra money has been given as a golden Hello to schools that are already doing well and have become academies. On the sidelines, poorly performing schools are to be run into the ground until competition from Free Schools and academies lure their pupils away and they have to close (I wonder what will happen to those who can’t for whatever reason get to an alternative school that is further away). I have to question the motives of a government that would do all of these things and wonder if it is really interested in what people think.
Just when I felt I had heard it all, the Coalition issued the results of OFSTED’s ‘Special Educational Needs and Disability Review – a statement is not enough’, to a fanfare of alarmist headlines that trumpeted about how half of SEN children are misdiagnosed so that parents can cherry pick schools and schools can claim extra funding that children without SEN can’t access. Apparently a statement is not enough – they don’t work, the teachers simply need to improve their skills and specialist placements are of apparently little benefit. Why on earth would the government place such a media spin on a document like this? It is a good question. The answer can be found in the headlines themselves – they were like propaganda, sowing the seeds of doubt about the legitimacy of the financial cost of supporting children with SEN. SEN children are now in danger of becoming the ‘Benefit Cheats’ of the Education world, who may well lose out when the results of the Green Paper are published, as an apathetic and accepting public looks on.
Do the general public care about children with SEN? I don’t know. I do know that they are suffering from CCCF (Collective Coalition Cuts Fatigue) worn out, tired by the election, the changes this wrought and with struggling to make ends meet in the down-turn. For all they know, the media and OFSTED may have a point about SEN children and their ‘sharp elbowed middle class parents’ trying to gain advantage and get access to provision those children without SEN (their children!) can’t have! How do I know this? I don’t really, but if you ask me, last week’s Conservative conference is a good indicator of public feeling. Families in higher income brackets found out last week that they will lose their child benefit in 2013. Now the Public was listening… and they were hopping mad! The views of the ‘sharp elbowed Middle Classes’ were very suddenly very much in evidence in the media, talking about how they could not manage without child benefit. They weren’t rich; they had obligations and had mortgages to pay.
The point in question in this discussion is not really about whether universal child benefit should go or not. The really significant part about these events was the way in which, in the face of opposition the government buckled and changed their policy. Faced with a backlash from the public, Mr. Cameron was soon saying that the Child Benefit cuts would be given back by a married couple’s tax allowance and that any plans to take away Child Benefit would obviously have to be reviewed… Suddenly money could be found and an instant policy was produced to try and sweeten the deal and give money back to the higher tax bracket earners with the other hand.
Well, our SEN children can’t manage without an education system that delivers help to those who need it, help that must be delivered and must be upheld. The statement of special educational needs gives them the security of a legal right to have their needs met and provided for in school where the provision is free at the point of access. The system for identifying and making provision for children with special educational needs is a flawed system but its saving grace is the statement of special educational needs. I will be looking to the Green Paper to strengthen a child’s legislative rights to support for SEN, not weaken them. Based on recent government behaviour, the more people who speak up and respond to the Green Paper the better chance we have of coming out of this process with a system that effectively meets the needs of children with SEN and disabilities.
This is the Big Yellow Taxi of our education system – all of the above is up for discussion and/or dismissal. These are the things that our SEN children stand to lose if we don’t participate with a loud voice in the democratic processes to canvass our views on SEN education reform. If we lose them, we really will find that we did not appreciate what we had until we lost it – difficult as it might have been to access it! It is so difficult I was moved to write a book about it! The Government is going to have its Green Paper, whether we like it or not, and it will probably make changes whether we like them or not. If we take a stand as parents or supporters of children with SEN and disabilities who actively wish to participate in the devising of new Education legislation to ensure all children with SEN can have their needs met, we have the best chance of our views being heard and acted upon.
Saba Salman commented on my recent blog post ‘Oh the times they are a-changin’ – but not yet’, saying: ‘so often the powers that be assume that public apathy or ambivalence will allow them to push through changes because no one other than the usual high-profile suspects can be bothered to read the small print. Hopefully not this time.’
Please don’t let our children with SEN lose their legal rights to an appropriate education, or allow the government to deliver a cheaper, watered down SEN strategy because people did not stand up to be counted. The consultation closes on Friday. If you have some time and you care about children with SEN and disability, or I have successfully pestered you or otherwise made you feel obliged, please make time to contribute.
Please share this post with as many people as you can think of who might wish to have a voice on this consultation.
Filed under: Education and the new government, Uncategorized | Tags: Conservative conference, Ed Balls, education, Education Minister, Michael Gove, Murdoch
I had to comment on this article, ‘The Conservative conference: 10 things we learned about Michael Gove today – http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/blog/2010/oct/05/conservative-party-conference-michael-gove?showallcomments=true#end-of-comments
I think it is time to ask the question: ‘what qualifications does Mr Gove bring to the role of Education Minister?’ Wasn’t he a journalist for a Murdoch paper? He talks a lot about his actions being evidence based, but frankly I don’t see it. He avoids giving answers to key questions, for example the issue of whether businesses will be permitted to make a profit from their involvement in Education. Any minister that truly wished to improve Education would not begin by spending more money on children in already successful schools and taking money away from those children in the least successful schools.
Ed Balls said in a recent speech that he doesn’t think that Michael Gove has a clue about Education, and the more I see and hear from the Education Minister the more I have to concede, ‘I agree with Ed!’
Filed under: Education and the new government | Tags: Coalition, coalition cuts, Education Minister, instrument lessons, Music, review, SEN
Very shocked to find the Coalition saying something with which I agree. See Telegraph article http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/8022899/More-pupils-to-learn-a-musical-instrument.html However, the caveat here is that we are only actually promised a review that ‘will attempt to “broaden access” to instruments and allow more children to learn how to read music’ by the end of the year’, in an environment where many so-called non essential services are being cut. Music lessons are a huge benefit to all sorts of children in so many ways. I note that there are only 3 comments on this article, which is a great pity. I wish more people prioritised a broad musical education highly, it helps with speaking/listening, visual and auditory memory, social skills, maths, benefits children both with and without SEN, brings communities together and it is just plain old good old fashioned fun. It really has very little to do with expectations of being on the x-factor! I have in my time seen a number of instrument lesson access policies come and go in our children’s schools, which have always in the end resulted in money being asked for from parents who want their children to learn an instrument. I will be watching with interest to see how these plans pan out, or to find out if it is just so much ‘window dressing’ or being offered as a sweetener after all the other things that are going on in Education at the moment. Even if they do get this right it is the tip of the iceberg.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: Academies, Audit Commission, benefit cheats, Children with disabilities, coalition cuts, education, Education Minister, Free Schools, Health and Safety, Individual Education Plan, lifestyle choice, Ofsted, SENCO, Teaching Assistant
I urge you all to read this report for yourselves. I have not finished reading it myself but have in the first two pages encountered some seriously sweeping statements not properly backed up by research which aim to cut costs and enable publicly funded money to go to independent schools and private schools, academies and free schools.
I am going to take a little time to read and digest the report before I publish any analysis. However, the way this has been reported leaves a bad taste in my mouth. The report only became available on the OFSTED website after 9.30am today, after all of the bad headlines and scaremongering media coverage had been presented largely unchallenged.
The bit I have read so far is not based on evidence which stands any reasonable test and the conclusions are ideologically motivated rather than evidence based. Yesterday I commented on the Toby Young article which was scaremongering about Health and Safety and children with disabilities in schools. I said at that time that Toby would be declaring that disability is a ‘lifestyle choice’. It’s happened, although it is referred to as ‘special educational needs’. Watch the media as special educational needs becomes the new benefit cheat.
You don’t have to take this. WE don’t have have to take this! What has motivated OFSTED to do this? Follow the money… OFSTED obviously don’t want to go the way of the Audit Commission. Do we detect the hand of GOVE?
Filed under: Education and the new government | Tags: Advocacy, children and young people, Coalition, coalition cuts, disability, education, education cuts, Education Minister, equality, government policy, Green Paper, Minister of State for Children and Families, Sarah Teather, SEN, Special Educational Needs
The Green Paper: Children And Young People With Special Educational Needs And Disabilities – Call For Views was launched today by Sarah Teather, the Minister of State for Children and Families.
She has asked for the views of everyone with an interest in the needs of children in England with special educational needs (SEN) or disabilities. All views and perspectives will be considered in drafting a Green Paper on SEN and disability to be published in the Autumn. We have until 15th October 2010 to contribute.
You can respond online on the Dept for Education website. Here is the link.
I hope that any changes this may lead to will be positive ones. I will be responding, although I don’t hold out much hope that the provision for our children will escape the savage cuts planned by the coalition government. If we fail to participate in this opportunity to help define government policy, we can’t complain about any adverse results from the Green Paper, can we?
