So, after yesterday's post showing the headlines for the Assess, Plan, Do, Review Graduated Approach, we now turn to what happens if you've been there, tried that and the interventions that have been tried have had poor or no results on your child's progress.
If that is the case, and your SENCo can show that your child's needs exceed what can reasonably be offered from within the school's SEN resources, including what they can fund from the Local Offer of services for each child, then it's time to ask for an assessment for an Education, Health and Care Plan, or EHC Plan/EHCP.
You are not alone through this process. The new system provides, or should provide, a parental supporter, independent of the local authority or from the local Parent Partnership Service to help you. But at present, qualified IS's are few and far between so if you are planning to ask for an assessment or being transitioned from a statement, where you live will have a lot to do with what's currently available.
Below is our SNJ/Department for Education approved second Flow Chart, this time showing the process when you REQUEST an EHCP. This is the first part, before you know if you get one, sort of like it is right now. Except for the IS, if you have one.
Again, there is the image below that you click to enlarge, and below that a printable PDF on a white background to save ink and then a link to see it online that you can enlarge much more.
Alternatively, you can:
Flow Chart-Request an EHCP Assessment- click here for a PDF version with white background for ink-saving printing
Tomorrow, the flow if your local authority is going to conduct an assessment and on Friday, what to do about disagreements.
Please leave us some feedback. These charts have taken a lot of work so we hope you like them.
Tania is an experienced broadcast and print journalist & author. She also runs a PR, web & social media consultancy, SocialOro Media.
Tania is a rare disease & chronic pain patient advocate with Ehlers Danlos syndrome.
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Hi, thanks again for all the time & effort it’s taken to put these together. Just a couple of observations:
Colour version doesn’t currently enlarge when clicked
The box referring to the page number on which the diagram can be found was changed in the July version of the guidance – is now p154.
Hi, thanks for that, I will change as soon as I can. You can enlarge the colour version by clicking on it and using control + on your keyboard or pinch out on tablet.
Thanks and thanks for the pointer, will update.
Your immediate box for response to dissatisfaction is to resort to a tribunal…parents should be supports to consider using mediation first. Tribunal is very expensive and combative.
Not at all – we cover disagreement in the fourth installment, so hang on, we’ll get there!
Another brilliant chart – thank you!
Apologies for this (the charts are so good) please forgive the on-line co-production… the bold text in the first large white central box appears to be from a previous version “…to play a gather” .
Thank you again for putting in the time and effort for making these. I will broadcast/e-mail all four together locally.
Thanks Romany and thanks for your help – I appreciate anyone letting me know about typos so I can fix them. They are really easy to miss, no matter how many times you look at it – it really helps to have fresh eyes. I’ve emailed you to ask for a favour too.
x
From September, when people write to their LAs to request an assessment, do they still refer to it as Statutory Assessment, like now, or should people be using the words Education, Health and Care Needs Assessment?
As far as I know, it is still called a statutory assessment, presumably because the end result has legal force. You will find the similarities in the process don’t stop with a name – and this is why parents need to know what they are entitled to be involved with before they start.
Thanks for you earlier comment – it’s being taken care of. You get blurry after a while – and so did everyone else who checked it!
The code seems not to refer to “Statutory Assessment (Except in the title section of chapter 9!) It does however make 147 references to an “EHC needs assessment” the language used is going to take a while to settle
Yes. When I’ve heard it discussed – even in the DfE it’s been called statutory – which it is as it’s an assessment for a legal document, but EHC assessment is also correct. As long as people know what you’re talking about, that’s the main thing, I guess.