EDSYC says son has to be 're-regestered' to have an EDSYC ???

[ryansmum2]

DEAR ALL,

 

PLEASE can u help me ... i think i am being 'fobbed off' by high school and EDUCATINAL PYCOLOGIST ...

 

BASICALLY MY SON HAS BEEN ON sen rEGISTAR SINE THE AGE OF 7YRS OLD, and has always had regular Re-Assesments by hus edsyc (last one in june 2011, in preperation for high school) as it was boarder line as to wether he sould be placd in SEN Class, or mainstream...

 

everyone decided he should try mainstream, and if problems began, that he would the go into the sen class.

 

anyway, as i predicted , the problems have been HUGE ... sever shcool phobia , insomnia, vomitting before school, severe anxiety ... the list is endless

 

we have as parents ad many meetings with the school , thry keep telling us things will be put into place , one eg, is that they promised before xmas 1 to 1 support for french ... jan, no 1 to 1 maade phone call to sen teacher, she promised FAITHFULLY , that 1 to 1 would be there at the next lesson ... NO IT WASNT !

 

Anyway , i though , right , i'll go staight to the LEA and contact his edsyc, who told me ''he could do nothing untilp

l , my son had been re-referred to the service and this could take weeks or months untill my son could be seen'' he told me this was because my son had changed schools - he started secondry school , not moved out of the area or anything like that , in fact the high schoo is next door to the high school !

 

sould the 're-refferal' if it is 'true' , should it of been done before leaving primary , or should the high school of done it back in september when he started ?

 

im so confused , and feel like everyone is 'fobbing me off'

 

please can anyone help?

 

thanks so much , mel xx

[justine1]

Hi

 

From my past experience it does not matter how close the schools are as they often are assigned separate ed psych's. You will need to discuss the issues with his senco at his current school,if you have anything in writing about what they said they would provide I would copy everything and forward it to the LEA. I would then request a statutory assessment as no matter what the promise by law they have no obligation to provide it so it may be best to get a statement so they cannot back down from what the agree.

 

 

There is info on how to apply for a statutory assessment under the tabs in the education section on here but you can also get info on IPSEA websites and possibly the council sites too.

[Sally44]

My son also did not cope in primary school. Huge anxiety, vomitting before and on arriving at school etc. He finally refused school and developed some anxiety behaviour such as frequent coughing. He did not go to school for around 10 months. He was referred to Clinical Psychology and CAHMS due to threats to kill himself. He now has a further diagnosis of Anxiety Disorder and OCD.

 

Each school tends to have a different EP.

 

Each school has a budget of EP and SALT time. The school MUST seek the EP's advice before they go into school. So it is down to the school to seek their advice. You can talk to the EP and SALT, but they won't go in unless the school ask them to. So you need to have a meeting with the school SENCO.

 

I don't know if SEN law is different in wales to England???

 

What you need to understand is that there are two roads to getting support and provision in place for your son. The first involves waiting for the school to refer your son and use their EP/SALT budget - which is not alot ie. 6 hours per year for all the children.

 

The school and LA will fob you off.

 

The other route is to write to your Local Authority and ask them to carry out a Statutory Assessment for a Statement of Special Educational Needs. That requires the LA to ask each professional to assess your child and identify all their needs and make recommendations on how to meet each and every need.

 

The LA will produce a Statement from those reports and will finalise it.

 

Unfortunately LA's tend not to identify each and every need and the professionals that produce the reports tend not to quantify and specify, which is a legal requirement.

 

The reason they do this is because support/provision/therapy = money.

 

So when you receive the finalise Statement you maybe disappointed at how little it contains and now unspecific it is. That is deliberate by the LA.

 

So the next stage is that you have to send in an Appeal to the Special Educational Needs and Disability Tribunal service [sEND]. They will give you an Appeal date, and deadlines by which you must submit evidence to prove your case.

 

Then it depends on what you are aiming to achieve for your son.

 

I have recently won my own Tribunal and my son is now placed an a specialist ASD specific school for children with Aspergers/speech and communication problems. It is for children that are around average cognitive ability. It is an independent school [not one maintained by the LA], but because we proved at the Tribunal that this school is the ONLY one that can meet his needs, the Tribunal Ordered that the LA have to pay his fees to attend this school.

 

I had to get all independent reports from a Speech Therapist, Educational Psychologist and Occupational Therapist. They all had to attend the Tribunal as expert witnesses. I also had alot of support from Clinical Psychology and CAHMS and they did put their recommendations in writing.

 

You need to get a copy of the SEN Code of Practice, which you can download from the top of the Education Section of this site.

 

You can ask your LA to send you their list of secondary schools [maintained, approved, special, independent]. When that arrives, you will see that your LA does fund places at other schools, including private/independent special schools.

 

From the difficulties you are describing, I would advise that you do get Clinical Psychology and CAHMS involved. Ask your GP for a referal to them, and ask to be referred to professionals that have experience of working with children on the autistic spectrum.

 

We were told by our independent speech therapist that an SEN Tribunal will never recommend a child returns to a school they are refusing to attend. And often that is unfortunately the stage you have to get to before you go to Tribunal seeking a different placement.

 

That was what the Panel decided in our case. They said they did not believe that my son would ever agree to return to his mainstream primary placement, and they agreed that the LA could not realistically meet all his special educational needs.

 

We were asking for Speech Therapy, and Occupational Therapist and we also asked that a dyslexia teacher was bought in too.

[ryansmum2]

thank you both fot your help / advice / and time , best wishes mel xx

[bensmum2]

of the school wont ask for an assessment from the edpsych , or even if they will , do a parental reuest for a statutory assessment, my son suffered froms chool refusal, same symptoms as your boy , so bad we had to de register him and home school , years 7,and 8 he only spent half the tiem there and they promised loads of helpw hcih never materialised, they went so far as to blame us and threaten to put him on the child protection register even though we clearly had disgnosis of psycho somatic symptoms and school refusal, out of interest he also couldnt not cope with Frenc , whatever we tried and i believe this can be an asd trait , foreign langua ged. I home schooled him thorugh year 9, he stopped vomiting , the paisn reduced, he evens topped wetting teh bed which he had been doing for 8 years, i had ot go private twice for a proper diagnosis, and we had to go all the way to tribunal for a school, we got a statement on pour 4th attempt but they still tried to put him bakc in a mainstream school with over 800 pupils, in the end we won at tribunal, as the lea couldnt provide anywhere suitable for him we got a non maintained out of area special school and he hasnt looked back, no more illness and he has changed os much, he still doesnt do french cos he just cant/ i got a lot of help from IPSEA thye have advice lines and came to tribunal with me. They even have sample letters that u can copy. if u get refused , appeal and go as far as u can , Good luck x