Improving Special Educational Needs

school children playing with a colourful parachute on a playground

Our priority to provide high quality SEND provision on Island

We aim to provide high quality SEND provision for children and young people up to the age of 25.

To do this we have five main areas we will focus on. These include what success will look like so we know when we have achieved our aim.

What success will look like: Parents are confident that local mainstream schools are identifying and meeting their children’s needs through the early identification of SEND and ensuring timely access to relevant support and intervention.
What success will look like: Our SEN service are able to meet and exceed our performance indicators. High quality advice and guidance, leading to parental confidence in the system. Parents and carers have confidence in the system.
What success will look like: We have clear commissioning arrangement in place which support all children and young people. Through better commissioning, external parties pay their share of the costs.
What success will look like: School can access high quality outreach which ensures they have well trained staff, who can meet the needs of all children and young people.
What success will look like: A range of high quality advices, from a range of sources are able to support the statutory process. Children and young people benefit from more specialist support.
arm chairs, reading corner with soft lights, wooden bench and carved person in green garden

The Isle of Wight Council is creating more SEN places across the Island

We are going to create over 200 additional special educational needs places on the Island!

There will be provision for

  • Social Emotional Mental Health (SEMH) 
  • sensory (visual impairment and hearing impairment) 
  • those with Autism and Speech, Language and Communication Needs (SLCN)
  • high anxiety and other mental health needs 

There will also be

  • increased provision for young people who are medically unwell
  • new therapeutic learning environments

How we are going to achieve high quality SEND provision

We will

  • re-use school buildings
  • expand our primary and secondary special schools
  • expand 'resourced provisions' in our primary and secondary schools
  • develop and continually update our ordinally available provision
  • enhance joint commissioning of support between education, health and care services for children with SEND to ensure services work together effectively
  • ensure all children will have access to an educational setting that is appropriate to their needs
  • challenge aspirations and ambitions for all children and young people, dispelling misconceptions by supporting children and young people to achieve their goals
  • in partnership with schools and children’s services, be aspirational for the outcomes for children looked after
  • listen to children’s and their families’ voices to get the right support and help at the right time
  • collectively act as champions for vulnerable children when we recognise that they are not being served
  • from the earliest point in a child’s life, provide families with timely access to support so their experience improves, and the needs of their children are identified early and effectively met
  • incorporate the views of children and young people with SEND, children looked after and children with a social worker in order to minimise barriers to learning and ensure the holistic development of children and young people
  • through training and development, maximise the effectiveness of high quality inclusive teaching and assessment to promote swift identification of need and target appropriate, evidence-based intervention
  • collaborate with settings and schools to ensure quality transition for
  • all pupils at each key stage with the opportunities for personalised programmes where needed
  • ensure schools are fully aware of their responsibilities to keep all parents and carers informed of their child’s progress when they are falling behind and what is being done to address this
  • ensure we have a robust outreach offer which supports the whole system

Resource documents

These are background documents, and are not fully digitally accessible. We are working towards making all documents digitally accessible. In the meantime, if you would like to give us your feedback, or need the documents in an alternative format, you can email strategic.planning@iow.gov.uk

SEND Partnership Board Terms of Reference

SEND Partnership Board minutes

SEND self-evaluation

This is the first draft of the local area’s self-evaluation of SEND provision on the Isle of Wight.

Thank you to everyone who has contributed to this, especially the children, young people, parents and carers who have shared their views and experiences. Please send any feedback you have on this first draft to amie.cass@iow.gov.uk by 18 October 2024

Safety Valve Board

Contact email

strategic.planning@iow.gov.uk

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