The SEND Strategy for Children, Young People and Families in the Wakefield District 2020 to 2024
2020 to 2024
The SEND Strategy
for Children, Young People and Families in the Wakefield District
The SEND Strategy for Children, Young People and Fami lies in the Wakefield District 2020 to 2024
Foreword
In Wakefield we are ambitious for all our district’s children and young people and this is reflected in our aspirations for children and young people with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND). Our vision is for children and young people to be happy, healthy and safe and thriving in communities where families and services work together to help them achieve their potential and dreams. We recognise that children and young people with SEND will require additional support and a strong local partnership to help them achieve this vision.
This joint strategy outlines our key priorities to ensure we continue to improve the lived experiences of children and young people with SEND - it builds on our work to date and ensures continuous improvement. At the current time we are particularly conscious of the impact the coronavirus (COVID-19) has had on children with special educational needs and disabilities and the multitude of changes they have had to face in their day to day lives. Our staff and partners have worked hard throughout this time to minimise both the immediate and long-term impact of this on the outcomes for Wakefield children’s and are committed to continue to support parents and carers who may be feeling concerned about how this issue will affect their child/children.
Our strategy will achieve improvements in provision and outcomes that make a real and measurable impact on the lives of the children and young people with SEND. It reflects our ambition to have high-quality and appropriate local services and support for Wakefield’s children, young people with SEND and their families. Together we want to be ambitious, raise aspirations and improve outcomes through high quality local opportunities and services whilst maintaining a focus on resilience and independence towards a successful transition into adulthood and beyond.
Cabinet Member for Children & Young People
Wakefield Parent Carer Forum
Corporate Director for Children & Young People
Wakefield Clinical Commissioning Group’s Chief Officer
Vision
Our Vision for children and young people with SEND is the same as for all our children and young people
“to tell us they are happy, healthy and safe and thriving in communities where families and services work together to help them achieve their potential and dreams”
Disabled children, young people, and those with special educational needs, and their families will have:
• Partners at all levels working collectively to provide integrated, high quality family centred support;
• Recognition of identified needs, removal of barriers, support for aspiration and social inclusion;
• A focus on building resilience and improving the lived experience for children and young people with SEND and their families.
This aligns with the Wakefield Families Together Model and the Children and Young People’s Plan 2019 to 2022.
The Children and Young People’s Partnership has prioritised 3 further areas of focus;
• All children in Wakefield get the best start in life and are happy, healthy & safe
• All children and young people enjoy good emotional and mental wellbeing, are resilient and feel supported and safe in their communities
• Children and young people benefit from an inclusive education and are well prepared for their transition to adult life
We also recognise and want to be explicit about other areas that will remain intrinsically woven into our plan and the work of all partners. These cross-cutting themes are key to achieving positive outcomes for all of our priorities;
• Tackling and reducing child poverty and the far reaching negative impact it has on a child’s life
• Active engagement and consultation to ensure the voice of the child remains central in all that we do
• Creating strong & diverse communities where children and young people can feel safe and thrive
New Ways of Working is Wakefield’s response to addressing continuous service improvement through the implementation of a sustainable whole system partnership wide model of co-location and integration for early intervention, early help and children’s social care.
This approach will help us to deliver our vision of an integrated ‘Think Child, Think Parent, Think Family’ approach where we have one conversation at the right time, in the right place with the right service.
New Ways of Working will help us to deliver on our Early Help area of focus. Our relentless focus on this priority will, overtime, enable Wakefield’s integrated partnership to move from a resource intensive social care delivery model to an early intervention and early help approach.
We will work with families at the earliest point possible as we build our practice with partners throughout the district in communities and through a ‘team around the early years, school and family’ model.
Section 1
Introduction and Legislative Content
This SEND Strategy sets out a four year strategy for the challenges we will collectively tackle to improve services and outcomes for children, young people and adults with SEND, aged 0-25 years, in Wakefield, including a focus on Preparing for Adulthood (PfA) outcomes of employment, independent living, good health and friends, relationships and communities.
Whilst there is no statutory duty to publish a SEND Strategy in Wakefield it is important we demonstrate our commitment to continuous improvement in the area of SEND. The SEND strategy will assist in embedding the requirements of the Children and Families Act 2014 and the Code of Practice, January 2015, to improve the lives of Wakefield’s children and young people with SEND from age 0-25 and their families.
Our Strategy will focus on the following areas:
• Early and accurate identification of children and young people with SEND from 0-25
• Meeting the needs of children and young people with SEND from 0-25
• Improving the outcomes for children and young people with SEND from 0-25
The strategy fits into Wakefield’s wider strategic documents as below:
JSNA Chapter on SEND
The SEND Action Plan
Our Strategy
Local Area Self Evaluation
The legislative background: The Children and Families Act 2014 and the SEND Code of Practice 2015
The Children and Families Act 2014 outlines a significant reform agenda to improve services for children and young people with SEND and place children, young people and their families at the centre of decision making; giving them greater control over the services they receive and the outcomes they wish to achieve. The Act promotes the need for parents and carers to be engaged at an individual and strategic level, and crucially, the Act recognises the importance of children and young people being able to express their views and be heard, especially when a young person moves towards adulthood.
The Legislation and Duties placed on Local Authorities and Health partners are set out in the SEND Code of Practice, issued in June 2014 and updated in 2015.
The principles of the SEND Code of Practice, January 2015, are designed to support:
• The participation of children, their parents, carers and young people in decision making;
• The early identification of children and young people’s needs and early intervention to support them;
• A greater choice and control for young people and parents over support;
• The collaboration between education, health and social care services to provide support;
• High quality provision to meet the needs of children and young people with SEN;
• A focus on inclusive practice and removing barriers to learning;
• The successful preparation for adulthood, including independent living and employment.
The Act aimed to fundamentally change the relationship between professionals and children and young people with SEN and their families while maintaining the existing protections in the system. It did not change the definition of SEN but placed the views of children, young people and parents at the heart of the system. Education, health and social care services can achieve more by working together to ensure that we achieve the best possible outcomes for children and young people, including the skills and confidence to live and work independently.
The Wakefield Context
Wakefield had their first Ofsted/Care Quality Commission (CQC) Special Educational Needs and/or Disabilities (SEND) Local Area Inspection 12 June to 16 June 2017.
The inspection found that the Wakefield Local Area has a number of strengths in the way the SEND Reforms have been implemented and some areas for development. The inspectors noted that there are plans in place to make further improvements such as greater involvement of parents and carers to co-produce the local offer of resources and support for children, young people and families.
Inspectors found significant weaknesses in the local area’s arrangements for completing specialist diagnostic assessments of autistic spectrum disorder (Asd). As a result, the local area had to produce and submit a Written Statement of Action which explains how this will be dealt with to make rapid and sustained improvement.
Hmci determined that the area’s Clinical Commissioning Group (Ccg) was responsible was responsible for submitting the written statement to Ofsted. This was declared fit for purpose on 20 November 2017.
On 3 and 4 June 2019, Ofsted and the Care Quality Commission (CQC) revisited Wakefield to decide whether the local area has made sufficient progress in addressing the area of significant weakness detailed in the written statement of action issued on 4 August 2017. Inspectors determined that the local area has made sufficient progress to improve the area of serious weakness identified at the initial inspection.
Covid-19 – Whilst recognising the massive challenges this has brought to children, young people and families along with the long-term impact it is important to learn from the experience. Parents and carers and partners are keen that as we move forward we keep some of the best practice developed jointly in response to the pandemic. In particular, the close working relationships with the Wakefield Parent Carer Forum, Advice and Support Service (Sendiass) and other key partners as well as the creativity, innovation and pace at which improvements and new ways of working can be implemented and incorporating the increased integrated working around cluster teams and the links into schools through the Wakefield Families Together and the ‘Team Around’ approach.
Governance and Accountability
Wakefield has had a SEND Strategic Partnership Board in place for a number of years. The purpose of the board was initially to plan for the 2014 and 2015 reforms, moving to oversee the implementation and embedding of them and drive up improvements in the SEND area. This multi- agency board is vital in enabling the SEND reforms as well as providing challenge, influence and support at a strategic level.
Membership comprises of:
• Wakefield Council • Wakefield Clinical Commissioning Group (Ccg) • Barnardo’s Wesail • Mid Yorkshire Hospital NHS Trust • Wakefield Parent Carer Forum • Kids Yorkshire • Wakefield College • Special School Head Teacher representative • Schools representative
A number of work streams, are in place with each dedicated to delivering specific key outcomes to drive up improvements for SEND. These work streams have and will continue to evolve over time to meet current and future needs and priorities. Some areas of work link into the wider priorities of the Local Area and as such these area will be overseen and led by other Boards with updates provided to the SEND Strategic Partnership Board.
Review
The strategy will be reviewed annually in conjunction with stakeholders and will be overseen by the multi-agency SEND Strategic Partnership Board who will monitor progress on our key priorities.
The strategy has been produced with a range of stakeholders and will be shared widely with multi-agency partners and published on their websites. A copy of the strategy will be available on the Local Offer Website http://wakefield.mylocaloffer.org and copies can be requested by email from: SEND@wakefield.gov.uk
Wakefield District May 2020
Wakefield has 3 nursery schools, 113 primary schools and 18 secondary schools. In addition Wakefield has 4 special schools and 3 Pupil Referral Units (PRU).
Wakefield schools, including special schools, are in the following Ofsted categories: (15 June 2020)
Wakefield has four primary specialist resource provisions linked to schools. Three are for Communication and Interaction and one is for Deaf and Hearing Impairment needs.
Wakefield has four secondary specialist resource provisions linked to schools. Two are for Communication and Interaction, one for Visual Impairment and one for Deaf and Hearing Impairment needs.
Wakefield also has three Pupil Referral Units. Two of the units are for Social, Emotional and Mental Health (Semh) needs, one for primary and one for secondary aged pupils. The third unit has a number of different centres for various needs including Speech, Language and Communication (Slcn), Autistic Spectrum Disorder (Asd), Semh, those medically unfit to be in school and those in physically in hospital.
The total number of children and young people on roll is 53,860
Based on January 2020 School Census, there are 53,860 pupils in Wakefield with 275 in nursery schools, 32,542 in primary schools, 20,235 in secondary schools, 575 in special schools, 233 in pupil referral units. Of these 2149 young people had an Education and Health Care Plan (EHCP).
Outstanding 16.3%
Good 65.2%
Requires Improvement 16.3%
Inadequate 2.1%
School age pupils at SEN Support
11.90% of school aged pupils in Wakefield are at SEN support compared with
11.90% of school age nationally
Source: January 2020 Census
Source: 2019 Local Interactive Authority Tool
School age pupils with an Education Health and Care Plan (EHCP)
3.30% of school aged pupils in Wakefield with an EHCP compared with
3.10% of school age nationally
Source: January 2020 Census
Source: 2019 Local Interactive Authority Tool
The main primary needs of Wakefield pupils with SEN Support or an EHCP are:
16.2% Other
14.2% Asd - Autism Spectrum Disorder
17.3% Mld - Moderate Learning
Difficulty
6.5% Nsa - ‘SEN support’ but no specialist assessment of type
needed
19.7% S Semh - Social, Emotional and
Mental Health
19.9% Slcn - Speech, Language &
Communication Needs
6.2% Spld - Specific Learning
Difficulty
The secondary needs of Wakefield pupils with SEN Support or an EHCP are Speech, Language & communication (19.9%), Social and Mental Health (19.7%) and Moderate Learning Difficulty (17.3%). The same top three primary needs are the same as nationally. However where as one in five (19.9%) children and young people have Slcn, nationally it is almost a third (30%). Nationally the second primary need is Moderate Learning Difficulty (Mld) at 20.9% and Social, Emotional and Mental Health (16.3%)
Between 2017 and 2020 the number of pupils with Slcn increased by 25% (1213 to 1624), Semh increased by 16% (1347 to 1606) and Mld decreased by 4% (1469 to 1413). However the biggest increase has been Asd by 33% (778 to 1157).
The secondary needs of Wakefield pupils with SEN Support or an EHCP are
8.3% Asd - Autism Spectrum Disorder
13.6% Mld - Moderate Learning Difficulty
16.6% Semh - Social, Emotional
and Mental Health
33.9% Slcn - Speech, Language &
Communication Needs
6.2% Pld - Physical Difficulty
6.9% Sld Severe Learning
Difficulty
16.2% Other
Of the 8159 children and young people with SEN Support or an EHCP, almost a quarter (23.8%) have a secondary need. This equates to 1944 children and young people. Combining both primary and secondary needs, the top three are Slcn 22.6% (2283 children and young people), Semh 19.1% (1928) and Mld 16.6% (1678).
Wakefield is one of 5 Metropolitan Districts in West Yorkshire and is made up of 40 towns and villages with a total population of approximately 345,000.
The population of young children aged 0-19 in Wakefield is 77,454; this is 23% of the total population
Children’s Health Challenges
Rates of childhood obesity are increasing
More children are being
admitted to hospital
with injuries
Rates of children achieving good levels of
development are low
Mental health and
wellbeing is an increasing priority
SEND
The total number of EHC plans has continued to increase
There were 390,100 children and young people with Education, Health and Care (EHC) plans maintained by local authorities as at January 2020. In Wakefield we had 2149 young people with EHCPs.
This is an increase of 36,100 (10%) from 2019. In Wakefield the increase is 10.5%.
Nationally the total number of children and young people with statements of special educational needs (SEN) or EHC plans has increased each year since 2010. Wakefield is in line with this statement and is in line with the National average. See the table below:
Year Numbers of Statements/EHCPS 2015/16 1334 2016/17 1561 2017/18 1715 2018/19 1807 Jan 2020 2149
Post 16 Plans have increased from 0 in 2015 to 404 in 2020 this is an average increase of 17.73% year on year.
In 2019, 60.4% of new EHC plans nationally were issued within 20 weeks. In Wakefield we issued 86% within 20 weeks. This percentage has continued to rise in 2020 and currently stands at 95.6%.
Our SEND strategy links to our needs and resource modelling for our SEND cohort, our more detailed plan (SEND Provision Plan) around this work can be found on the Local Offer website at http://wakefield.mylocaloffer.org/s4s/WhereILive/Council?pageld=4030
Our plans will ensure high quality specialist provision available locally for those that need it.
Section 2 Our priorities for the SEND Strategy 2020-2024
Wakefield Council has been working closely with partner agencies, including schools/academies, colleges, the local health community, our parent carer forum and children and young people to ensure a continued effective local area response to the SEND reforms and to identify our key priorities.
Key partners have agreed the SEND Strategy for 2020-2024 will focus on the following key priority areas:
1. The Local Offer – reduce gaps in services by strengthening joint commissioning. Improve communication with key partners, children, young people and their families and ensure clarity of the support available.
2. The emotional and mental wellbeing needs of children with SEND are met with evidence based support which enables them to feel safe, supported and resilient.
3. Ensure that children and young people with SEND have appropriate needs based support and provision from 0 to 25, which will successfully enable the achievement of both educational and PfA outcomes detailed in Priority 5 on page 19.
4. Reduce school exclusions for children and young people with SEND, improving attendance and ensuring consistency of inclusive practice across all settings.
5. Children and young people with SEND have appropriate support at key transition points from entering the Early Years Foundation Stage to preparing for adulthood.
6. SEND Covid-19 recovery plan - partnership working to deal with the short, medium and long-term impacts of the pandemic and ensuring the positive changes are embedded in new service delivery models.
7. All partner organisations will embed a culture of learning and continuous improvement for SEND keeping co-production with parents, carers, children and young people at the centre of all our work and utilising best practice from within Wakefield and other regional and national partners.
These priorities will be delivered collaboratively across the Local Area within the Council, settings, schools, colleges, health partners and the voluntary sector.
Key Priority One
Local Offer – reduce gaps in services by strengthening joint commissioning. Improve communication with key partners, children, young people and their families and ensure clarity of the support available.
• Increase Local Offer Champions and membership of Local Offer Together group to achieve a greater reach and improve impact.
• Remove barriers that exist within organisations enabling communications and key information to be shared without delays.
• Ensure all Partners/Services take ownership and responsibility for their areas of the Local Offer ensuring it is parent carer friendly, kept up to date, co-produced and gaps are identified and tackled.
• Ensure consistency of support covering up to age 25; commissioning arrangements should reflect this and services need to offer the range of support required for all age groups.
• Ensure resources are prioritised for areas that have the most impact on improving the lived experience for children and young people with SEND.
• Further embed SEND into Joint Commissioning.
• Embed the Wakefield Families Together model across SEND.
• Ensure strong links with Wakefield Safeguarding Children Partnership and Build our Futures.
How we will measure impact and progress:
• Parent and Carer Survey
• Number of Local Offer hits/reach via Facebook
• Annual Local Offer audits to be undertaken
• Publishing ‘You said we did’
• Contract Monitoring of commissioned services
• Multiagency events to consider impact of Wakefield Families Together model
Key Priority Two
The emotional and mental wellbeing needs of children with SEND are met with evidence based support which enables them to feel safe, supported and resilient.
• The emotional and mental well-being of children and young people is recognised as the responsibility of all those engaged with children and families. Early support and recognition across the partnership supports children and young people to develop resilience and reduces the risk and impact of long term mental health needs into adulthood.
• Through increased early support we will reduce waiting times for all emotional and mental well-being services including the more specialist clinical and therapeutic interventions provided by CAMHS (Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service).
• Emotional and mental well-being support for those with SEND is an integrated offer across universal services from Health Visiting and schools to more specialist interventions provided by social care short breaks and CAMHS.
• Pathways to support emotional and mental well-being from agencies are clearly understood by children, young people, families and agencies. Including families being able to seek support through self-referral.
• To continue to develop the integrated working for emotional and mental well-being including the workforce develop programme undertaken by the Primary Intervention Team to include recognition of the needs of children and young people with SEND.
• Development of a 0-18 pathway for diagnosis of Asd – and to expand this provision over time to include recognition of other neurodevelopmental needs which may not fit the diagnosis criteria for Asd e.g. Foetal Alcohol Syndrome Disorder (Fasd).
• For those with Learning Disabilities (Ld) and neurodevelopmental needs to develop a holistic and integrated offer of support across community paediatrics, emotional and mental well- being services including more specialist mental health input from CAMHS, including behaviour support and crisis intervention. To recognise the need of children or young people to be supported by their families to the best of their ability and capacity, and for integrated services to offer the right support to families to enable this.
• To develop a clear understanding with our children, young people, families and professionals about the emotional and mental well-being needs of young people with Ld or neurodevelopmental conditions and how this may present in a variety of ways, including behaviours which challenge. For the pathways of support to be integrated across agencies with a clear district wide approach and understanding, for example to agree an approach of positive behaviour support such as Team Teach or equivalent.
• To work across all aspects of health services from emotional and mental well-being to physical health services to develop the integrated offer and working models for 0-25 year olds with SEND.
• Emotional and mental well-being services for children with SEND need to recognise their diversity of need and also the diversity of educational arrangements from those in mainstream school, private schools, pupil referral units, special schools to those out of school provision either through exclusion, electively home educated or unable to access school due to the needs.
How we will measure impact and progress:
• Waiting times for Pit (Primary Intervention Teams) and CAMHS
• Feedback from families
• Outcome measures for Pit, Community Navigators
• Outcome measures to be developed for the Ld/Neurodevelopmenta service
• Kpi (Key Performance Indicators) from Pit re training modules provided to professionals/Vcs and families including the evaluation of training modules
• A reduction in specialist CAMHs admissions/Cetr (Care Education and Treatment Review) residential placements
Key Priority Three
Ensure that children and young people with SEND have appropriate needs based support and provision from 0 to 25, which will successfully enable the achievement of both educational and PfA outcomes detailed in Priority 5 on page 19.
• Continuing to strengthen integrated working between education, health, early help and social care teams using the ‘Wakefield Family Together’ model to provide effective and efficient support.
• Specialist Services are redesigned to have the greatest impact on children and young people’s outcomes, including narrowing the gap, by inclusive practice and by providing needs based support.
• Education, health and social care services work together to make sure children and young people with SEND get the right support to help them gain meaningful employment and live as independently as possible.
• Robust and consistent processes are in place for identifying needs enabling appropriate support to be provided at the earliest opportunity.
• To work across all aspects of health services from emotional and mental well-being to physical health services to develop the integrated offer and working models for 0-25 year olds with SEND.
• Children and young people with SEND can access education close to where they live enabling them to be an active part of their local community. For our more detailed plan please view our SEND Provision Strategy.
• Undertake regular strategic reviews of SEND placements for children and young people to inform future planning in partnership with key stakeholders.
• Introduce an updated and more robust training offer for staff within settings and wider partners including families.
• Improve Educational Outcomes so that the gap is narrowed for children at SEN Support or with EHC Plans.
• Promote safe, inclusive social activities/provision for children, young people and young adults with SEND. For those who are home educated to ensure their inclusion in their community.
• Support the development of partnership working between clusters of schools including mainstream and special schools/ settings providing flexibility of approach for individual children and young people.
• Embed high quality annual review processes and ensure annual review monitoring and evaluation leads to effective support and challenge where necessary.
• Undertake regular quality assurance reviews of EHC plans to include ensuring health and social care elements are strengthened and communication across partners further developed.
How we will measure impact and progress:
• Quality Assurance Audits of EHC plans demonstrate improvements
• Evaluation of Annual Reviews
• Measuring the quality and impact of training and how this is used in practice
• Evaluation of the short breaks provision
• Maintain the levels of children and young people accessing out of authority provision
• Re-design of SEND services delivers inclusive practice across settings and schools and more effective support for the education system
• Educational Outcomes for young people with SEND at Ey, Y1 phonics, KS1, KS2, KS4 and KS5
Key Priority Four
Reduce school exclusions for children and young people with SEND, improving attendance and ensuring consistency of inclusive practice across all settings.
• Link with the ‘Strengthening Inclusion’ project to reduce exclusions both for those pupils with EHCPs and those on SEN Support.
• Remove barriers across education, health and care that impact on school attendance, intervening early when issues arise using support from the Wakefield Families Together model.
• Improving attendance becomes everybody’s business and appropriate challenge and support is provided by the education welfare service.
• Enable schools and settings to ensure consistency of high quality inclusive practice at SEN Support level and re-design services at Senss and Lss to assist in the delivery of this.
• Embed a culture of partnership working with parents and carers, children and young people.
• Improve the data collection and analysis of a range of SEND outcomes and use it to drive improvements.
• Use the skills and knowledge in our special schools, mainstream schools and settings in partnership with LA specialist service expertise to improve practice in mainstream settings.
• Develop a group of up-skilled experienced SENCOs across the system who can provide effective setting to setting support to develop inclusive practice.
• Develop a continuum of inclusion support (the Wakefield Way), a core training offer for all settings and schools and expectations of reasonable adjustments and curriculum adaptations that support the needs of children and young people.
How we will measure impact and progress:
• Reduction of fixed term exclusions for children and young people with SEND
• Reduction in permanent exclusions for children and young people with SEND
• Improved attendance rates for children and young people with SEND
• Increased support offer at SEN support
• Improved parental satisfaction levels for children and young people on SEN support
Key Priority Five
Children and young people with SEND have appropriate support at key transition points from entering the Early Years Foundation Stage to preparing for adulthood.
• Embed effective identification of SEND across all education phases and evaluate against regional and national figures. Improve mechanisms for Health/Ccg to inform LA of children with SEND needs under compulsory school age.
• Ensure our data analysis identifies any key trends at transition points in order that these can be effectively addressed by partners.
• Provide good practice guidance on transitions for all children and young people with SEND including strategies to address parent and carer key concerns. Encourage and support peer to peer learning.
• EHCPs and short break services cover transition points and robustly prepare young people successfully for adulthood. We will further embed Preparing for Adulthood (PfA) outcomes from Year 9 and map destinations and pathways, enabling young people (with SEND) to move successfully into adulthood.
• Increase aspirations for young people with SEND with a focus on the four PfA outcomes: employment and higher education, living independently, the best health possible and having friends and relationships and participating in their communities through such initiatives as ‘Project Search’ and jointly remove any barriers preventing young people reaching their potential.
• Data is effectively used to improve longer term planning for SEND services including or adult services. Use an effective set of qualitative and quantitative measures for young people and PfA outcomes.
• Ensure strong links are maintained with our local Further Education providers for young people with SEND supporting them to attain the skills they need to move successfully through their education; and follow accredited and vocational opportunities through participation in volunteering opportunities; work tasters, work experience/placements; supported internships; traineeships, apprenticeships; job coaching; and substantive employment.
• All educational providers should have first term discussions with parents and young people, where appropriate, about their choices of schools (primary, secondary and Fe) to ensure planning and preparation is effective enabling a successful transferring of phases of education for children with SEND.
• Co-design with parent, carers and young people a 5 day offer for post 19 young people across Wakefield involving all key partners and linking in effectively with employers.
• Ensure strong links with the Neet strategic board and key partners within the Council such as Re-generation and Skills.
• Enable young people to develop the skills and confidence they need to become as independent as possible with reference to: travel; increase their ability to organise, plan and effectively manage their daily activities, including, managing their finances, cooking and cleaning; living on their own or with others; and developing and maintaining positive relationships with friends and others into adult life.
How we will measure impact and progress:
• Increased number of young people obtaining employment
• Evidence that more young people reach a level of academic attainment which will commensurate with their underlying abilities and support their aspirations
• Evidence of appropriate support at all transition phases
• Joint audit of EHCPs demonstrates a focus on PfA outcomes
• Evidence of strategic influence of parents, carers and young people in design of services Post 16
• Reduction in the number of children and young people with SEND Neet or Not Known
• Identification across all age ranges will be in line with national and regional trends
Key Priority Six
SEND Covid-19 recovery plan - partnership working to deal with the short, medium and long-term impacts of the pandemic and ensuring the positive changes are embedded in new service delivery models.
• Capture the positive elements of working during Covid-19 and delivering services to parents and carers and children and young people. Use the feedback to embed into future delivery models, building in more choice and control for families.
• Use technology to improve efficiency and impact enabling resources to extend further.
• Maintain the closer strategic links and communication channels with partners developed in response to Covid-19.
• Ensure commissioned services have a focus on the new and/or increased areas of need as we recover from Covid-19.
• Ensure the impact on children and young people can be effectively captured and analysed across partners.
• Develop new ways of providing health assessments across specialities dependent on need for proximity, social interaction or handling of the child and young person in response to changing infection prevention and control guidance from Public Health England.
• Ensure a timely health response to requests for assessment information and ensure partners are aware of changes to NHS England guidance. Maintain strong communication with partners regarding local response and the impact on services during Covid-19.
How we will measure impact and progress:
• Evidence of new ways of working embedded
• Evidence that issues raised by Parent Carer Forum are jointly addressed
• Commissioned services amended to meet increased demands
• Parent and carer surveys
Key Priority Seven
Embed a culture of learning and continuous improvement for SEND keeping co-production with parents, carers, children and young people at the centre of all our work and utilising best practice from within Wakefield, other regional and national partners.
• Strategic partners will focus on continuous improvement with each partner taking responsibility for learning from good practice in other areas and using the knowledge to improve practice and services locally.
• Further develop the voice of young people through existing groups and with wider cohorts.
• Develop more creative ways of gathering the views of children with SEND and incorporating them into the embedding, evaluation and monitoring of the SEND duties.
• Create more opportunities to share best practice and learning at a local and regional level.
• Widen the strategic influence of parents and carers into all SEND services.
• Engage in Adcs (Association of Directors of Children’s Services) peer reviews to evaluate progress and develop services.
How we will measure impact and progress:
• Data is effectively used to drive up service improvements across partners
• Evidence of continuous improvements are captured
• Parent and Carers strategic influence is increased
• Evidence of how children and young peoples voices are captured more creatively and used to develop services
Glossary
Strategy The plan and actions the organisation intends to take to achieve long-term goals.
Adcs Association of Directors of Children’s Services
AP Alternative Provision
Asd Autistic Spectrum Disorder
CAMHS Child and Adolescent Mental health Service
Ccg Clinical Commissioning Group
Cetr Care Education and Treatment Review
Dco Designated Clinical Officer
Dmo Designated Medical Officer
EHC plan / EHCP Education, Health and Care Plan
Fasd Foetal Alcohol Syndrome Disorder
Kpi Key Performance Indicators
Ld Learning Disabilities/Difficulties
Mld Moderate Learning Difficulty
PD Physical Disability
Pit Primary Intervention Teams
PfA Preparing for Adulthood
Pmld Profound and Multiple Learning Difficulties
PRU Pupil Referral Unit
Salt Speech and Language Therapy
Semh Social, Emotional and Mental Health
SENCO Special Educational Needs Coordinator. In some schools and academies these may be called Sendco
SEND special educational needs and disabilities
SEND Code of Practice 2015 the Code outlines the working arrangements for the Children and Families Act 2014 SEND measures
SEND Local Area inspection - Ofsted and the Care Quality Commission (CQC) inspect local areas together to see how effectively they fulfil their responsibilities for children and young people with special educational needs and/or disabilities.
Sendiass Special Educational Needs & Disabilities Information Advice & Support Service.
Slcn Speech, Language & Communication Needs
Sld Severe Learning Difficulties
Vision - An aspirational description of what an organisation would like to achieve or accomplish in the mid-term or long-term future
Wft – Wakefield Families Together
Yot - Youth Offending Team
240257 Designed and produced by Wakefield Council, Communications 11/20
Why this page, not just a PDF? The original is a PDF - fine to read, but a poor fit for assistive technology: heading structure is often inconsistent or absent, text doesn't reflow for zoom or a narrow screen, and screen readers can struggle with multi-column layouts and scanned pages. This page is the same content rebuilt as plain, semantic HTML - real headings, text that reflows, nothing a screen reader or zoom tool trips over.
Republished from City of Wakefield Metropolitan District Council under the Open Government Licence v3.0. View the original PDF.