What happens if I need more help and support?

What happens if I need more help or support?

Schools want to work together with parents, carers, young people and our partners to make the SEND process go smoothly for everyone. Unfortunately, sometimes things do go wrong.

You may identify a variety of indicators that suggest your child needs additional support. These include

  • Your child may be unhappy or doesn’t want to attend school
  • Your child’s behaviour in school may deteriorate.
  • Your child may be making limited progress. 
  • You may find yourself disagreeing with what the school is saying or feeling unsatisfied with the support that your child is receiving 

Resolving issues quickly is important for your child. If you feel that you need some advice or an opportunity to talk to someone outside of your child’s school. Oldham’s information and advice service is available. 

This short video explains the information and advice service available in Oldham:

If your child has special educational needs or a disability, but does not have an EHC plan :

We encourage you to talk to your child’s school. You may want to talk to the class teacher or the SENCO. If you want support or more information about what to do, we suggest you contact Oldham SENDIASS (Special Educational Needs and Disability Information, Advice and Support Service):

Oldham SENDIASS offer an impartial service providing information, advice and support to children and young people with special educational needs and disabilities, or their parents and carers.

If you have spoken to your child’s school and you are still unsure of what to do:

You may want to be sure what the responsibilities of schools are and may want some independent advice from Oldham SENDIASS

If your child has special educational needs or a disability, and you have asked for an EHC assessment or your child has an EHC plan:

We suggest you talk to your child’s school, the SEN Team at Oldham, or the plan coordinator for your child’s assessment, so that we can help to find a solution. You may also want to talk to Oldham SENDIASS.

We hope that by talking together early we will be able to deal with your concerns, but if that does not happen there are more ways which can help.

If you have asked for an EHC assessment and it has not been agreed upon, or if, when it has been agreed, there are some issues unresolved:

  • You will receive a letter, outlining the decision and why and what your next course of action is:  We suggest that you first talk to the SEN Team or the plan coordinator. You may also want to talk to Oldham SENDIASS. You can also go to mediation, which will hopefully resolve the problem.
  • If you want to appeal your case to the SEND Tribunal, then you must, first of all, consider mediation and contact a mediation adviser before registering your appeal with the SEND Tribunal. All of this will be outlined in the letter you receive once the decision is made either not to assess or not to issue.  You can also seek advice from Oldham SENDIASS.

If your child has been excluded and you are concerned that the school has acted incorrectly. 

If your child has special educational needs, the school must demonstrate that they have made reasonable adjustments and interventions to address any underlying issues that lead to challenging or disruptive behaviour.

There are guidelines about what should be considered before deciding to exclude a child from school. If you are concerned that the school has not followed these guidelines you should talk to the headteacher without delay.

Mediation and Disagreement Resolution Services

We would like to resolve any disagreements at an early stage and will meet with parents and young people to discuss issues that arise.
If parents or young people would like to have mediation to resolve the disagreement there is a mediation service available in Oldham:

Do you have a complaint?

It is important that you are clear whether your complaint is about a School matter (in which case it should be sent according to the School complaints procedure which will be available on the school website) or about the team or individual staff working within the SEND 0-25 service

It is important in either case that you follow the process. If you remain unhappy this can be escalated to the ombudsman. The ombudsman will only become involved when the complaints process has already been completed.  

Resources for parents in Oldham