SEND capacity challenges go beyond 2014 reforms, and everything from more early-born children to more screen time could play a part says Rebecca Leek
I was bumped from the Today programme recently. I don’t blame the BBC, though. The Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) had reported, yet again, that the burden of the current SEND system on school capacity and finances was driving us off a cliff.
I was probably going to be asked whether this was felt at school level. Yes. And was this something we recognised – an increasingly complex cohort of children coming through? Yes. And what, they would no doubt have asked, are the reasons for this?
How long is a piece of string…
This curiosity and head-scratching fascinates me. Why is there a boom of children struggling to regulate their emotions? Why are there so many children with arrested physical or language development?
How is it that the number of EHCP assessment requests have sky-rocketed? The reasons are not that difficult to unpick.
Why needs are more complex
Fine motor activity undertaken by very young children has reduced. How many times did you tie your shoelaces in the 1980s, and how many children tie shoe laces today?
Screens incrementally take up more of children’s time than they did a couple of decades ago, when they barely existed.
One in four children finish primary school obese, so let’s take a bet that children are less active.
Not to mention the fact that there is a societal expectation for us parents to launch ourselves back to work as quickly as possible.
None of this makes for especially happy children.
There have also been some changes in clinical care for babies born at 22 weeks.
In 2019 new guidance was issued that led to more pre-term infants being given survival-focused care.
Consequently, there are now more children who are very early born, and who have an increased risk of various health conditions and learning difficulties.
And we within education are just expected to handle this change. Well done us.
Heads buckle under strain of EHCP case loads
Add to this a general confusion around providing boundaries for children clearly and calmly (which they need) versus overly permissive approaches which don’t help anyone. Not to mention a neurodivergence free-for-all. Do I want to say that? Yes I do.
The system that we currently have – formulated in around 2014 is completely unworkable.
When I was a secondary school SENCO in 2015, of an albeit quite small secondary, I had four students with EHCPs.
I did not have excessive amounts of time but I had enough. Just.
I speak with headteachers of primary schools now who are buckling under the complexity and administrative strain of an EHCP caseload of over 40.
The system is the same – the expectation of careful reviews, termly meetings, co-production conversations and detailed planning.
If the process of seeking advice, evaluating, collating, writing up, monitoring and so on takes about three days per pupil across the year (and that’s conservative) – you don’t need a maths GCSE to work out that it is completely unsustainable.
Why I might start praying
So we are told reform is on its way. I hope it is radical and bold.
If there is going to be a central electronic system for each child’s specialist documentation (alleluia), I hope it will be built with insight and input from the people who will be using it.
I also hope it is built with the sole aim that it will lead to better outcomes for these children. In fact, I think I might start praying. Because we have all been presented with “clever new systems” that meet neither of these criteria.
I am glad to read about the idea that some children’s plans will be initiated at birth. This will save a lot of unnecessary “proof creation” when we already know that a child has a complex health condition.
What I am already not glad about is delays. We were told it would come last term. And then January. No wonder the IFS is quaking in its boots.
We are all on the edge of our seats. Change cannot come soon enough.
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