Page 99 - SEN114 September/October 2021

Petition watch
Require School SENCOs to be fully
qualified for the role
School senco’s to be qualified before they take the role
and they must have done in depth training on special educational needs. The current role can be filled by a person not qualified for the role and they have 3 years to qualify.
petition.parliament.uk/petitions/591092
Require all school staff receive
training on SEN children
All school staff should be required to take a course on children with special educational needs (SEN). Too many school staff don’t have any idea how to engage with SEN children!
petition.parliament.uk/petitions/587365
Government Response: Appropriate School Provisions
Reforms to teacher training
The Teachers’ Standards define the minimum expectations of teachers’ professional practice and personal conduct. These standards set
clear expectations that teachers must have an understanding of the needs of all pupils, including those with SEND.
To support all teachers, we are implementing a ‘golden thread’ of high-quality teacher training reforms. These reforms are designed to emphasise the importance of high-quality teaching and to ensure teachers have the skills to support all pupils to succeed. This includes those pupils identified within the four areas of need set out in the SEND Code of Practice and children in need of help and protection as identified in the Children in Need Review.
Further support for the workforce
Special Educational Needs Co-ordinators (SENCOs) play an essential role in schools, supporting teaching staff to meet the needs of pupils with SEN and ensuring that schools have a clear and effective approach to inclusive education. Every maintained nursery, maintained mainstream school and mainstream academy must have a qualified teacher designated as SENCO.
The Department has provided funding to the Whole School SEND consortium since 2018. Funding in 2021- 22 will bring the total funding for this contract to over £8 million since 2018. We have also funded the Autism Education Trust (AET) since 2011 to deliver autism awareness training to education staff in early years, schools and further education settings.
Department for Education
Create an emergency fund for ASD
(autism) & ADHD assessments
The Government should create an emergency fund to deal with waiting lists for autism & ADHD assessments for children AND adults.
petition.parliament.uk/petitions/589677
Increase funding for Child and
Adolescent Mental Health Services
Provide more funding to CAMHS (child and adolescent mental health services). Additional funding should be used for better training and more staff, as well as more sites to make it more accessible.
petition.parliament.uk/petitions/575532
More funding for local authorities to
assess and support Autistic children
What is needed are social workers specialised in Children with disabilities and not safeguarding social workers. Two different assessments and this needs to be recognised.
petition.parliament.uk/petitions/585737
Ban Applied Behavioural
Analysis for autistic people
The Government should ban Applied Behavioural Analysis (sometimes referred to as “conversion therapy” for autistic people), and accept that being autistic is ok and autistic children shouldn’t be subject to “therapy” like this. Many autistic adults can attest to the horrors of ABA.
petition.parliament.uk/petitions/578616
Fund more school places for students
with special needs
It should not be a fight to get children into a suitable special needs school, there should be enough places available.
petition.parliament.uk/petitions/585658
Introduce a statutory Mental Health
Policy to all schools in England
Introduce a specific policy for schools which follows the Mental Health Act 2017.
This policy should promote inclusion and reasonable adjustments, with the aim to ensure pupils with significant mental health needs can access education regardless of their limitations.
petition.parliament.uk/petitions/584017
Make British Sign Language a language
option in the national curriculum
Make British Sign Language an option for students to study at school.
petition.parliament.uk/petitions/579898
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