Special Educational Needs - information for parents
Information for parents on the Special Educational Needs process and statutory assessments.
What is a statutory assessment?
This is where the school begins to consider what your child's special educational needs (SEN) are and take the necessary steps to make sure that special help is put in place to support him or her.
A statutory assessment is only necessary if your child does not make progress with the specialised help the school has put in place, from for example, an educational psychologist, speech and language therapist or other health professional.
What do we do?
As soon as we receive the request for a statutory assessment we will write to you to:
- tell you that we are considering whether to carry out a statutory assessment
- tell you how we will carry out the statutory assessment if one is done
- explain the timescales - this will be no longer than six months in all
- give you the name of the person who will be your point of contact, this is the Named officer
- ask you to give written or spoken reasons, called 'evidence', about why you think your child should or should not be assessed - you will have 29 days to send us your information
- tell you about our parent partnership service who will be able to help you with independent advice and support
- ask you if there is anyone else you would particularly like us to talk to about your child
- ask you for any evidence or opinions you have collected or intend to get
- encourage you to provide us with evidence to consider
- tell you and the school of our decision and our reason for doing so.
We have six weeks to tell you whether we will carry out a statutory assessment of your child.
If you are not happy with the answer or reason we have given, you should talk to the school to find out what can be done. You can also talk to the parent partnership officer.
If we decide not to carry out an assessment you have the right to appeal to the First-tier Tribunal (Special educational Needs and Disability) if you disagree with our decision.
How do we carry out a statutory assessment
If we agree to carry out a statutory assessment we will ask a number of professionals to give their views on your child and will ask advice from:
- your child's school or early education setting
- an educational psychologist
- a health professional or doctor
- Social Services (who will only give advice if they know your child)
- anyone else whose advice we consider appropriate.
You will be asked for your views again – this is separate from asking you whether you think your child should be assessed.
We may also ask what your child thinks about their SEN. What your child thinks plays an important part in our assessment.
After the assessment we will decide whether to provide you with the outcome of the assessment in a document called a statement of special educational needs. We will normally do this within 12 weeks from the start of the assessment.
If we decide not to make a statement, we will give you our reasons and tell you how we think your child could be supported in school, early education setting or in other way.
Once we have consulted you with the statement and you are happy with:
- the contents of the statement
- the support you child is to receive
- any amendments you ask us to make
- the school of your choice,
we will issue you with a final statement within 8 weeks of the draft statement.
For a more detailed explanation of the process 'SEN – A guide for parents and carers' can be obtained from your named officer.