School Action Plus

[openyoureyes]

Need Help again

My son 11yrs came home yesterday (last day of school) with a letter to say they are putting him from School Action Plus to School Action. He will start year 8 in September. I am absolutely fuming over this, typical that they give the letter on the last day of school so I cannot go in a wring there necks.

 

Does this mean that he will get less help next year? his school report was ok on the effort front, A's and B's for effort which is great but his results were appalling in the exams (what we expected really, as I knew he was not taking in much learning all year).

 

Where to I go from here in the school holidays, is there anything I can do whilst the schools are off?

 

I am so sick of having to battle with the school and sick of shouting and seemingly not getting anywhere. I wondered if Parents Partnership could help.

 

Any advise would be greatly appreciated.

[Zemanski]

This is terrible news, a reduction in support at this stage is not good, the first three years in high school are critical and exactly the time that support needs to be maintained.

 

Com did really well in Y7 so the school decided, without telling us or him at all, that they would reduce his support by a third in Y8 (illegally as he has a statement, unfortunately as your son has no statement there is no requirement for them to maintain his support at any given level).

 

The result was disastrous.

 

Com went to pieces. The school put the support back in but the damage was already done. In Y9 they put in a completely new package with loads more support but it was too late for him to recover and now he is out of school and won't be returning to a mainstream environment, he simply can't cope with it any longer.

 

although school is closed you can still write to the governors and the social inclusion department will be open through the holidays - you may be able to speak to his ed psych or a responsible officer. Parent partnership will be open too and may have some advice.

Do you have a contact for the autism advisor or outreach team? if not you can probably get through to them through the inclusion department.

Numbers will be on the LEA website.

 

I'd ring IPSEA and see if they have any advice

 

good luck

 

Zemanski

[KarenT]

I've been told that a child's status will fluctuate between School Action and School Action Plus depending on what help is being provided at the time.

 

School Action means that the needs are being met without support from outside agencies (ie from school staff only). School Action Plus is when another agency is involved at whatever level.

 

Example: J was on SA at the beginning of the year as he had no outside involvement. Behaviour Support Team were called in to do an assessment - his status changed to SA+ at that time. BST concluded that no input was needed from them so he reverted back to SA.

 

Does the letter explain what has changed to put your son's status back to SA? I'd have thought you should be able to find out via the Education Department, whether schools are open or not. Either way, you deserve an explanation.

 

Karen

x

[barefoot wend]

openyoureyes

 

I would ask them not to do this - very much for the reasons given by Zemanski. Tell them you think this is an inappropriate time to consider lessening his help as adolescence is looming and this can be exceptionally challenging for a child with AS.

 

I think it is more likely that your son will need MORE help not less. If you have access to CAMHS, GP or professional I would ask them for some written back-up.

 

My son was on SA+ and there was talk of reducing it to SA in Easter of Year 7 due to the enormous progress he had made. Things then went very wrong which culminated in his leaving school altogether at the end of Year 8.

 

Try to keep as much support as possible.

 

Barefoot

[openyoureyes]

thanks so much for your help and support, I really feel strongly that B has more help in Yr8 not less, his report from school said that his organisation was good, however, I wonder how good this would have been if myself and his support teacher did not check his bag every day and remind him what he was doing each day. Some times I wonder whether to let B just go about his business without help for a week to show the school just how much home help he gets, but then this would be very cruel on him.

 

I will defo contact parent partnership and others as you say during the holidays. I too believe that B needs more help in yr8 not less, he really does not seem to be understanding what he is learning and his English teacher did say at his parents evening that he really needs one to one in English, so I cannot believe that the SENCO feels that he requires less support next year. When we asked about getting one to one in English we were more or less turned down and given more English lessons rather than a second language!!!

 

Oh well, at least I know where we are going now, just got to get my head around it and make sure we get what we want this time.

 

thanks again for all your help it means a lot to know there are others out there

[lisa]

Think of it this way. You have 6 whole weeks to prepare your case as to why you think it's a bad idea to reduce his support and gather your evidence. The SENCo will be off on her holidays without a care about school so you're at an advantage!

 

Unfortunately you'll probably spend the whole holidays working on it and worrying if you're anything like me, when you could do with some time out from the constant school battles. Hopefully come September, you'll say you disagree and with any luck the school will say no problem, we'll keep him at SA+.

 

 

Lisa