It’s been a year since the Nottinghamshire local area partnership SEND inspection report was published. In this edition you’ll find information about progress being made to make positive changes for young people with special educational needs and disabilities in Nottinghamshire.

Read more about the progress that has been recognised by the watchdogs as well as the areas that need to be focused on.

You can also hear what some of the partners on the improvement board have to say about changes being made and what’s next.

For an at-a-glance view of progress made and work still to do, view the infographic.

In Nottinghamshire we have been developing a special educational needs and disabilities strategy since autumn 2023 and have been supported by the Research and Improvement for SEND Excellence (RISE) Partnership.

Nottinghamshire's SEND Partnership Assurance and Improvement Group (PAIG) considered the draft strategy at its May meeting and it is due to be published by the end of June this year.

You can read the RISE partnership's  published report on its work with Nottinghamshire. 

A new free special school will be built in Nottinghamshire  is part of an initiative announced by the Department for Education, and is set to provide specialist support for 160 pupils, aged four to 19.

This will support our efforts to create additional special school and alternative provision places, to address the growing demand across the county.

This is in addition to the new special school already planned for Ravensdale near Mansfield set to open in 2025.

We are working to improve how families can navigate SEND processes and services in Nottinghamshire and have started to map out the different services available from 0 to 25-years-old.

To make sure that this is developed in a way that makes it useful and usable, we now need feedback from parents, carers and young people. We are offering different ways to get involved and provide feedback - either attending a virtual session with us or sharing your thoughts and ideas on the work so far.

Simply email us using the button below to let us know you’d like to take part and we will be in touch!

278 families took part in a survey about neurodevelopmental support services earlier this year to understand their experiences about services and the referral process.

The main findings of the survey are:

• Parents would like to be updated frequently at one or two months intervals on the status of their referral with their preferred methods of communication being via email or letter.
• The main information that parents would like is around waiting times and the referral process, particularly what to expect during each appointment.
• Parents felt that they would benefit from local support on education, parenting and neurodiversity information.

The findings of this survey will be used to better meet the needs of neurodiverse children and young people in Nottingham and Nottinghamshire.