Section 2 of the Act requires authorities to prepare a CSP for children and young people with enduring additional support needs that have a significant, adverse effect on their education and require support from outwith the education authority19. CSPs should focus on supporting a child or young person to achieve learning outcomes and assist the co-ordination of services from a range of providers.
Across all authorities, most key staff, parents, partner and voluntary agencies expressed concern in relation to the term ‘significant’ and its links to eligibility for a CSP. Consistency in interpreting the legislation surrounding the criteria for a CSP varied greatly across education authorities. There was not yet a standardised approach nationally. Although most authorities made reference to the decision-making tree in Chapter 4 of the Code of Practice, a few had developed their own decision-making tool based on the Code. Almost all authorities wished to have clearer guidance on the criteria for a CSP in order to relieve the apparent confusion on how much support was ‘significant’ and whether the terms ‘complex’ and ‘multiple’ meant the same. A significant number of key staff in authorities believed, mistakenly, that where a child or young person’s needs were being met within the school and existing resources, they did not meet the requirements for a CSP.
Almost all authorities had policies outlining authority arrangements for the identification and provision for children and young people with additional support needs including those who require a co-ordinated support plan.
Most authorities had a central steering group of multi-agency staff to oversee and make decisions about which children and young people should have a CSP. The groups generally had a quality assurance role. Their purpose was to ensure fairness and a consistent approach to managing decisions about co-ordinated support plans, to build parents’ confidence in the decision-making process and to remove the overall responsibility for decision-making from school-based staff. Authorities described this group as a ‘validation’ group or ‘multi-agency scrutiny’ group. A small number of authorities had jointly funded clinical posts in mental health with health services. These practitioners played significant roles as part of strategic groups and in working with school nurses to provide effective support for young people with mental health issues. The majority of authorities had arranged multi-agency training days to focus key staff on the criteria for preparing a CSP and to provide an opportunity to write a CSP. Most authorities had appointed staff to oversee the criteria for determining whether children required CSPs and the quality of the content of the plan.
A quarter of authorities had provided children and young people with more robust IEPs where they did not meet the criteria for a CSP. A few parents felt confused about these non-statutory support plans. Targets set within these plans were almost always wholly generated by the education authority, although in most cases consultation with appropriate agencies had taken place prior to drafting the plans. Voluntary agency staff reported that parents were confused by the range of planning formats being offered in some authorities which were neither CSPs or IEPs. The quality of CSPs and additional support plans varied across authorities. Where appropriate training had been provided for staff in writing CSPs, the quality was generally good. A few were not sufficiently comprehensive and targets set within CSPs were not SMART.20
A small but increasing number of authorities had agreements with residential special and secure accommodation providers about whether children and young people placed there should have CSPs. Authorities rarely assessed children and young people with social emotional and behavioural difficulties to establish whether or not they met the criteria for CSPs. Where children with social, emotional and behavioural difficulties had CSPs, in some cases, the plan did not contain learning targets.
Just under half of the authorities were looking at their ICT infrastructure and possibilities of using a database with restricted access to enable key multi-agency staff to share information effectively. The database would keep up-to-date, key information about the numbers of children and young people with additional support needs, including those with CSPs or support plans such as IEPs.
Where CSPs were prepared, most parents were satisfied with the process and outcomes. However, the majority of parents and voluntary agencies were not confident that multi-agency services identified at the assessment stage for their children would be provided. A third of authority-based staff and most parents and staff from voluntary agencies were concerned at the low number of CSPs which had resulted from the procedures for managing transition from Records of Need to co-ordinated support plans. In most schools, headteachers and classroom teachers felt that the number of children and young people with CSPs was too low.
The following charts provide information about the numbers of children and young people who had or did not have a Record of Needs at 14 November 2005 and who now have a co-ordinated support plan. It is clear from the charts that the proportion of children and young people with CSPs varies widely across authorities. (Note: Where the number of children or young people is fewer than five, this appears as zero on the charts).
Children/young people who did not have a Record of Needs (per 1000 pupils) and who now have a co-ordinated support plan.
Children/young people with a Record of Needs at 14 November 2005 (per 1000 pupils) and who now have a co-ordinated support plan.
Although a small number of authorities had appointed educational psychologists as central co-ordinators, almost all authorities did not see the co-ordination and management of co-ordinated support plans as the role of the psychologist. Along with education authority-based development officers, psychologists in almost all authorities provided co-ordinators at school level with important and valuable advice and training on a wide range of issues related to the Act and criteria for preparing a CSP. They were particularly helpful in assisting school-based staff to make decisions about whether the criteria for preparing CSPs were satisfied, and provided advice in writing plans, including educational objectives. In the best practice, authorities had provided helpful training for agencies and school-based staff on joint writing of educational objectives. One authority had developed a helpful target bank of educational objectives for CSPs to assist staff with examples of SMART targets. Some voluntary agency staff thought that key staff responsible for writing CSPs would benefit from seeing clear, well-written examples of CSPs.
A key issue for authority-based and multi-agency staff concerned the statutory timescales for completing assessments. Health and social work managers in just under half of authorities expressed concern about their capacity to respond to a request for help from an education authority in assessing a child or young person within the statutory ten-week period from the date that the request was made. Education authorities serving island areas had experienced problems when allied health professionals only visited islands on a three monthly basis. If, for example, a medical appointment with a child was missed, the authority found it difficult to comply with the timescale. A few authorities had experienced difficulty in ensuring that requests to assist them in carrying out an assessment were directed to the appropriate health professional. Most authorities had experienced difficulty in sourcing information to assess young people presented to them as ‘cold cases’ within the timescales. Further timescale issues related to cross-authority placements of children and young people and lack of clarity about the duties of independent providers. Staffing issues and heavy caseloads were also an issue, particularly for speech and language therapy managers.
Key strengths
Areas for improvement