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Statements !!

valley girl

I am sure that many of you out there have been through the nightmare of refusals to assess,refusals to issue statements and trying to deal with Sendist. We took 3 years to get my nine year old sons statement and we were over the moon when it arrived in July. Great we thought - things will be much easier now. Not so !! Even though he has a statement for 23 hours a week I am still having to chase up everything, go and see the teacher everyweek and generally check everything is being provided. My relationship with the school is getting worse rather than better.

My son is in Year 5 now and we need to start considering secondary schools. We try to be positive but I cant see him surviving there let alone making progress.

Is anyone else feeling this way or had the same problems  or have any advice !!

Are Statements worth the paper they are printed on !!

xxx

 

  • Hello,

    We are not quite in that situation yet, but we're well on our way (waiting for draft statement). From our own experiances and those of others this is fairly typical. In theory everybody is working towards the common good of the child, the reality is that almost everybody is a jobsworth, watching their own backs, budgets and sticking up for their pals. No LA *wants* to issue a statement and no school wants to be the recepient of one, it costs money to implement and if they can break you down to the point you'll give up, it's surely a lot cheaper for them to do so. It's sad that it's like this, but it is. We've had to work very hard and do a lot of research into our rights, what other people are supposed to be doing and so on just to make it this far. The school are unhelpful to the point of being obstinate liars, even telling the LA that "all is well" despite none of the IEP targets being met review after review.

    It does frequently feel like banging your head against the wall, but at the end of the day, the law is largely on your side albeit you need to enforce it with regular vigour. A statement is a legally binding document, the school/LA *must* implement it and you should not have to keep checking on them (though we will be doing the same!)

    Don't be afraid to complain to anybody and everybody who will listen, but do it in writing by recorded delivery so there is a record. We've been advised to make a complaint to our MP about our EP, heck, we'd write to the The Sun if it would help.

    There are a lot of sources of support, including financial contributions, spend a day on the phone and 'network', you'd be amazed at who and what is out there.

    Keep it up, you've got further than a lot of people.

  • Hi Valley Girl

    My guess is that this is really common.  Our son eventually had to come out of his local primary school as things completely broke down.  At the time he had a very inadequate statement, and although the school seemed willing, didn't really understand the extent of his needs so couldn't meet them.  We visited every school in the area, and eventually opted for a specialist boarding school which was a dramatic and scary choice for us.  To get his statement changed and the funding for school we worked with IPSA (a volunteer body we got in touch with through NAS) and prepared to go to tribunal.  Our authority eventually changed his statement and gave us the funding.  It was a hard fought battle, taking a lot of time and energy and worry about what we were doing.  It shouldn't be like that but that is how it was.

    My advice is - get information on what is available, get the support of professionals in your judgement about what your son needs, and just go with what you think is best.

    Good luck