Written evidence from Long Marston VA Church of England Primary School (SEN 70)

Education Committee

Solving the SEND Crisis

I am writing because, from my perspective the system is broken. As a small school in rural Hertfordshire, we have see the level of SEND for children who require or have an EHCP explode. Many of the needs are in children who would, even recently, have had their needs identified earlier and a special school place would have been found.

This isn’t happening. Let me give you an example. I have one child who has arrived, age 6, who has delayed his start to Reception. He has never been seen by a professional and is working at 0-6 months in many areas, is spoon fed, in nappies and preverbal. We have gone from 3 EHCPS to 12. This is over 10% of my school with EHCPS, many of which have specialist level of needs. My team are on their knees. My SENCO is at breaking point.

Solution – what we need

Funding

As a small school, having to fund the first £6k is prohibitive and schools with more needs are penalised disproportionally compared to those with less needs. A TA full time is £24k with oncosts which means my school budget is in deficit. Small schools, with the tightest budgets, are disproportionally affected too as parents of children with SEND are choosing schools that have small, nurturing environments.

The team I have are experienced, highly skilled and many are expert SEND teachers. The problem is that they are trying to also teach the rest of the mainstream class. If we had the funding to set up a resourced provision in the school, including capital expenses to build if necessary, then potentially, many of these children would have their needs met here, and may not need to move to specialist settings.

System change

There are too many hoops to jump though. The little boy I mentioned above needs an SLD school place now and we are one term into getting an EHCP for him. He should just be able to go now and then worry about the details of what his EHCP looks like when he gets there!

Local authorities need more man power at every level of the EHCP chain. There are NO Ed Psyches in Herts to assess children currently so, once again, our school budget is paying £900 per child for assessment, diagnosis and report as I can’t let these children go through my school without the support they need. Many schools are not doing this so children are going through the system with EHCP level need with no EHCP.

Early Intervention and parental preference

Children need their special needs and disabilities identified early. If they come to school with provision outlined or, if they have specialist provision identified early on then we would avoid the chaos in the system currently. Currently, we are seeing parents choosing mainstream schools when the needs of children are clearly identified as specialist. Very rarely, when consulted, I have said we can’t meet need (and I don’t say this lightly) and I am totally ignored in lieu of parental preference. I have 24 years in education and I would never say this unless I meant it. I wish that my expertise was listened to and parents didn’t always have the final say for children with specialist level needs. Once these children arrive we then have the struggle to find them a specialist place.

Value school staff

I appreciate that this is a priority you are looking into. My concern is that excellent teachers, SENCOs and Heads will leave in the meantime. Staff need to be recognised, valued, paid well and encouraged to do the amazing job they do to change lives every day. People are leaving the profession in droves (fortunately not at my school) and this has to change if we want the best people to support our most vulnerable children. Pay teachers more, encourage schools to be flexible with working patterns and supporting work life balance by ensuring schools have the resources and funds to meet SEND needs. 

I really hope this has impact and we see changes for our most vulnerable children.

January 2025