Residential special schools and colleges:
the experiences and outcomes of children
and young people
Summary of the responses to the call for
evidence
Mark Geraghty
CEO/Principal
Seashell Trust
[email protected]
The RSS Team
Co-chairs
Dame Christine Lenehan, Director CDC
Mark Geraghty, CEO Seashell Trust
Support to the RSS Review
Rory Mcerlean DfE
Mark Geraghty
CEO/Principal
Seashell Trust
[email protected]
• Some of the questions we needed to ask regarding
the Minster’s commissioned review of Residential
Special Schools (RSS)
- Sir Martin Narey’s review of Care homes – July 2016
- How many children are placed in Residential Special
Schools?
- Where are they?
- Why have they been placed there?
- What drives stakeholders to use RSS?
- 20 years since this area was reviewed,
Mark Geraghty
CEO/Principal
Seashell Trust
[email protected]
• We received 221 responses to the call for evidence,
represented as follows:
- Academic
- Child or young person
- School/college staff
- Representative body
- Other
- Charity
- Local authority
- School/college
- Parent/carer
Mark Geraghty
CEO/Principal
Seashell Trust
[email protected]
4
6
8
9
12
21
25
42
94
Summary of Responses
- Call for evidence confirmed that the RSS/ISC sector exemplifies
many of the larger issues facing the SEND sector,
- Tensions between LA budget constraints, parental
preference and meeting children and young people’s needs
- Difficulties delivering genuine multi-agency working
- Achieving an educational offer that’s both high-quality and
ambitious for these C&YP
- Preparing for adulthood and transition to post-19 support
Mark Geraghty
CEO/Principal
Seashell Trust
[email protected]
• Characteristics of the C&YP currently in RSS/ISCs
- Pupils who tend to be placed in residential placements are
those with either social, emotional and mental health needs,
autism and/or severe learning difficulties and challenging
behaviour, or complex health needs.
- Respondents felt the mental health needs of C&YP with autism
were becoming increasingly complex.
Mark Geraghty
CEO/Principal
Seashell Trust
[email protected]
• Characteristics of the C&YP currently in RSS/ISCs….
continued
- There are also pupils with less intense needs in residential
placements, generally because their parent/carers have
expressed a preference for the provision and been prepared to
fight for it.
- Increasingly, parent/carers are seeking residential placements at
post-16 to help their children learn independence skills.
Mark Geraghty
CEO/Principal
Seashell Trust
[email protected]
The Stats!
- 342 residential special RSS/ISCs across 92 LAs
- 150 of these are independent schools,
- 49 non-maintained special schools,
- 90 maintained or academy
- 53 post-16.
The most common in the South and West of England:
London 10;
East Midlands 32;
South West 49;
Mark Geraghty
CEO/Principal
Seashell Trust
[email protected]
North East 15;
East of England 36;
North West 53;
Yorkshire/Humber 25;
West Midlands 39
South East 80
Pattern of Provision across the Country; How it is
Commissioned and Procured
- Parental responses were almost unanimous about the lack of
suitable provision available to meet their child’s needs locally.
- Some respondents felt that LAs didn’t commission places, they
shopped for them!
- Some LAs admit their commissioning is too reactive, others have
encouraging plans to develop more flexible provision in-county
Mark Geraghty
CEO/Principal
Seashell Trust
[email protected]
Pattern of Provision across the Country, How it is
Commissioned and Procured ……. continued
- LAs were unanimous in their desire to meet need more locally, both
to preserve the child/young person’s links with their family and
community and to save money.
- Some schools and representative bodies complained about the
procurement practices used by LAs, feeling they were too focused
on contractual compliance rather than the needs of the child.
Mark Geraghty
CEO/Principal
Seashell Trust
[email protected]
What Good Quality Support Looks like for these C&YP
both Pre- and Postplacement
- Parents spoke of their frustration at the lack of early support
services offered to them, often by health and social care. Felt more
accessible short-breaks, and better CAMHS support for their
children, could prevent the need for these placements arising later.
- Many issues were identified upstream from residential provision by
parents, LAs and others, particularly in mainstream schools.
- Some felt a target-driven culture led to schools adopting noninclusive practices for children with challenging behaviour,
exacerbated by their ignorance of positive behaviour support and
autism more generally.
Mark Geraghty
CEO/Principal
Seashell Trust
[email protected]
What Good Quality Support Looks like for these C&YP
both Pre- and Postplacement.
- Some C&YP spoke of the loneliness they experienced in
mainstream provision, citing bullying, being made to feel stupid and
feeling like their school had given up on them.
- Some schools expressed a desire to offer more outreach services
to local schools to support inclusion/early support, but feel LAs are
reluctant to do this due to the adversarial relationship they take
toward independent/NMSS provision.
- Some LAs admit that while they can often identify pupils that could
develop complex high needs later in life, too often it takes a crisis
before action is taken.
Mark Geraghty
CEO/Principal
Seashell Trust
[email protected]
What Good Quality Support Looks like for these C&YP
both Pre- and Postplacement. …continued.
- Some have begun to develop dynamic risk registers
- Some schools felt if pupils were referred to them earlier their
support could enable them to return to their local community.
However, some LAs said they only considered a residential
placement as a last resort, because once a pupil entered residential
they were too often there for life
Mark Geraghty
CEO/Principal
Seashell Trust
[email protected]
A Snapshot – Next Steps!
Questions?
Mark Geraghty
CEO/Principal
Seashell Trust
[email protected]