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For too long, the experiences of many children and young people with SEND and their families, in Devon, have not been good. This must change. Children, young people and parent carers have told us what needs to change. We need to act on this and deliver results.
Our new 'Devon Local Area Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) Strategy 2024 to 2027' sets out a clear vision and public commitment to a change in culture and practice that improves these experiences.
We've put together this special edition of our Devon SEND newsletter to share the strategy with you.
The Devon local area partnership was inspected by Ofsted and the Care Quality Commission (CQC) in December 2018 and was required to produce a 'Written Statement of Action' to address four areas of significant weakness. In May 2022, the local area was revisited by Ofsted/CQC who concluded that no progress had been made. You can read the full reports from Ofsted and CQC here.
The Dedicated Schools Grant deficit reached £164m at the end of March 2024. Devon has entered into an agreement with the Department for Education (commonly known as the Safety Valve) to reach a financially sustainable position by the end of the 2026 to 2027 financial year, with the aim of paying off the deficit by the 2030 to 2031 financial year.
Despite efforts to improve, lots of families continue to express frustration and disappointment, describing their experience as a ‘battle’ or a ‘fight’. Families grapple with bureaucratic hurdles, poor communication and a lack of joining up between agencies.
The system for supporting children and young people with SEND in Devon has fallen short of expectations. We acknowledge where we have failed and recognise that our attempts to do better have not been good enough. Families rightly demand real improvements that positively impact their day-to-day lives.
Our vision is for children and young people to have the opportunity to thrive, with access to the right support in the right place and at the right time, so they can fulfil their potential and lead happy, healthy and productive adult lives.
The voice of children, young people and their families
Our SEND strategy is informed by all the information we've gathered from engagement activities with families, schools and other key partners across the local area, alongside a range of data.
We are working to deliver meaningful change in our culture and practice that leads to improved experiences and outcomes for children and young people with SEND and their families. This change must be driven by their voices.
To make sure that this happens, we are adopting The Four Cornerstones Approach, which supports genuine co-production in a way that listens to children, young people and their families and puts them at the centre of support and service development.
It was developed in 2011 by Genuine Partnerships (a not-for-profit community interest company from Rotherham made up of practitioners, parent carers and young people working together as equal partners) based on research involving children and young people with SEND and their families. It has been adopted nationally and Genuine Partnerships works with Contact (a charity for families with disabled children) to deliver training in local areas.
The Four Cornerstones are:
- welcome and care
- value and include
- communicate
- work in partnership
They are about behaviours and values, not processes, and will help us to embed a new culture which focuses on rebuilding trust and positive relationships.
Our strategy has four key commitments. These are the broad things that we are going to do. They are:
- we will think beyond barriers to support aspirations
- we will improve how we communicate
- we will develop better ways of working
- we will build inclusive communities
Each of these 'themes' has a number of specific things that we are going to focus on, including how we are going to measure our progress and details about what you can expect to see and feel when things have changed.
Our SEND strategy will be delivered through our SEND Transformation Programme.
There's an action plan for this academic year (2024 to 2025), with specific measurable things we want to achieve based around our four key commitments. It sets out what exactly we are going to do, and by when.
We are clear that this strategy should not sit on the shelf but should be a ‘live’ document that can hold the local area to account through robust monitoring and evaluation.
This will be done continuously, through talking to families, getting feedback from staff, examining performance data and conducting quality assurance work.
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