Bracknell Forest Council’s decision making executive has this week agreed to invest £350,000 in the special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) team. The investment will help to increase staffing, provide additional training and improve processes.
This follows on from the successful £1 million bid for government funding to improve services for children and young people with SEND and a successful bid for funding to build a new autism spectrum disorder (ASD) school.
It also follows on from the latest progress meeting on SEND improvements with the Department for Education (DfE). In that meeting, the DfE recognised that the council continues to give this work high priority and progress is being made. It also acknowledged the detailed Written Statement of Action (WSOA) plan is being well managed.
At its meeting on Tuesday, the executive also agreed the new SEND Strategy for 2023 to 2025. The strategy has been co-produced with a wide range of people including early years, school and college leaders, professionals from education, health, SEND, third sector and care, as well as parents, carers, young people and children.
It was developed following a series of community events held in person and virtually, online surveys, facilitated group discussions and one to one interviews. Tool kits that were created to engage parents, carers, children and young people were co-produced with the parent carer forum (PCF). These tool kits were identified as good practice by the DfE in a monitoring visit and have since been shared with other authorities as an example of good practice.
Cllr Roy Bailey, Executive Member for Children, Young People and learning, said:
“Improving services and opportunities for children and young people with SEND is a big priority. This additional funding will help secure extra staff in the council’s SEND team as well as provide more training and improve processes.
“Progress is being made for children, young people and families with SEND but we need this investment to make sure that we have the additional staff capacity to keep making tangible improvements and that staff have access to training and development. We will continue to work towards providing excellent provision for SEND to make sure that all the children in the borough achieve the best possible outcomes.”
The council participated in the first tranche of the government’s Delivering Better Value in SEND programme and successfully bid for £1 million funding to further improve inclusive services for children and young people with SEND.
In addition to the successful £1 million bid for the DBV programme, the council has also been successful in its bid to build a new ASD special school.
The £350,000 will be part of the 2023 to 2024 budget and will help pay for new members of staff specifically for SEND.
All sections agreed in the decision making executive are subject to the usual democratic process including the 5 day call-in period.
