Improving the Local Offer online

Mission EmployAble blog 600x400

Guest blog: Mission EmployAble - training for young adults with learning disabilities (5 minute read).

A café serving delicious food and with stunning views is the stylish HQ for a unique training programme for young adults with learning disabilities living in Hertfordshire and beyond. Mission EmployAble offers supported internships from its training centre within the very popular Café On The Common in Chorleywood.

Saying thank you to our SEND Online Feedback Group (7 minute read).

It's really important to us that families who use the Local Offer website can have their say in what goes on it. In this blog, you can read about the difference our SEND Online Feedback Group have made to the site, and you can sign up to join in!

Making SEND everyone's business (7 minute read)

Through a large and ongoing investment of £5m per year, we are on an improvement journey to grow and upskill our SEND workforce - recruiting and training up to 80 new frontline professionals who will be responsible for managing EHCPs.

30 April 2 young people talking and looking at a screen 600x400

Guest blog: coping with school when you're autistic (7 minute read)

In this guest blog, 19 year old Hana Kinney shares her experience of being in a mainstream secondary school as an autistic young person, and offers advice and strategies to help other children and young people get the most out of school.

9 March 23 -Talking about behaviour600x400

Blog: Talking about behaviour (5 min read)

In our latest blog, we discuss what we learnt from one really important and enlightening discussion with a parent - about the sensitivities on the topic of behaviour, as well as about the language we use and the effect it can have on our readers.

Guest blog: Mission EmployAble - open for business! (5 min read)

In this guest blog, Hertfordshire charity Mission EmployAble updates us on their new training cafe in Chorleywood which is proving a big success with both the interns and the customers! Read all about the cafe and the supported internships.

6 June SPR blog

Reviewing Sensory Provision in Hertfordshire (7 minute read)

We have recently reviewed the services for D/deaf, vision impaired, and multi-sensory impaired children and young people in Hertfordshire, to make sure they are giving families everything they need. Read all about what we learned, and how it will lead to improvements.

7 November: introducing the Mental Health, Learning Disability and Autism Collaborative

Guest blog: Introducing the Mental Health, Learning Disability and Autism Collaborative (3 min read)

We want to introduce you to the work of the MHLDAC, who are making great changes in the community, behind the scenes. This includes reducing the backlog of young people waiting for an ADHD assessment and creating new services for those experiencing a mental health crisis.

1 Dec Mission Employable blogbutton 600x400

Guest blog: Mission EmployAble - fulfilled lives for people with learning disabilities (3 min read)

Off the sofa and into paid work! Mission EmployAble is a UK charity which supports people with learning disabilities to lead fulfilling and rewarding lives. They offer young adults with mild learning disabilities a unique opportunity to gain the skills and confidence to find paid work in their communities.

Guest blog: Family Centres - helping children as early as possible with Early Adventurers (5 min read)

The Family Support Service have developed a new way to ensure that young children get support as early as possible, even when their needs might just be emerging. In this guest blog, they tell us about the new Early Adventurers group running at Family Centres across Hertfordshire.

Ask SALI phoneline for professionals (5 min read)

'Ask SALI' is a new phoneline for SENCos and professionals to call, for advice about meeting the needs of their children and young people with SEND. Here’s how the new service for professionals can be used to ensure your child is better supported in their school or setting.

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Improving statutory SEND (6 min read)

We've been making changes to statutory SEND. In this blog, we'll update you on the changes we have made, and are making in the future, to improve the Education, Health and Care Plan (EHCP) experience for families.

Local Offer put to the test (4 min read)

By law, every local authority must have its own Local Offer website, which must contain certain information within it.

This month we asked another local authority to put our Hertfordshire Local Offer website to the test, and we did the same for them in return - read the blog to find out how we got on!

Guest blog: How do we know what young people want? (3 min read)

Services for Young People need to know what young people in Hertfordshire think and feel, in order for them to provide the right support. Julie tells us how they find out what young people want, and what their biggest concerns are in 2022.

SEND Drawing competition - our winners (2 min read)

You might have entered, or been following, our SEND drawing competition - a whopping 559 people cast their votes on our shortlist, and here are the winners.

Demystifying mental health support in Hertfordshire (4 min read)

After a review of our mental health info with CAMHS and HPCI, we set out to do some research with families so we can make the info and advice we give on the Local Offer much better.

8 Feb blog 600x400 Our Children, Our Area (5 min read)

In this blog, we explain how we are using what we have learnt from the review of DSPLs and LSPs to create new and improved ways to support children and their families closer to their home.

26 July Early Years blogpost Early Years webpages re-fresh (3 min read)

With the help of parents from HPCI and our SEND online feedback group, we've given the Early Years pages of our website a bit of a refresh, to make them more relevant to parents of young children with SEND. You can read all about the changes we have made in our new blogpost.

29-Apr-YCH-blog-600x400 Guest blog: SFYP - Moving on from school (3 min read)

Whether you're headed to college, or university, or if you haven't yet decided what the future looks like, Services for Young People have some useful tips for anyone making their next steps after school.

23 Feb SEND Champion blog Guest blog: SEND Champions in Family Centres (2 min read)

SEND Champions understand the challenge families can face when trying to find information and support. They are here to lend an ear and give advice and guidance.

A woman answering the phone Guest blog: A single point of access for information (2 min read)

We’ve listened to what parents and carers have asked for and now have one central telephone number or email for all info, advice and support.

Guest blog: Experts by Experience social media takeover (2 min read)

Find out what happened when our Experts by Experience, Georgia and Chloe, took over our Local Offer social media channels for a week.

13 Oct - parent using laptop on couch The families behind the website - the SEND online feedback group (6 min read)

It's no secret that finding the right information and support has been challenging for families. Our parents and young people help because they want to make a difference in the future.

EHCP quality blog 3 ways we're improving the quality of EHCPs in Hertfordshire (3 min read)

Every EHCP should help a child or young person to develop and live the life they want to live. However, we often hear about how much plans can vary in quality. Here's what we are doing about this.

Everything in one place - what's on in Hertfordshire (2 min read)

We have launched a new events tool for you - which is more appealing, useful and easy to use.

An illustration depicting a clipboard with writing around it Guest Blog - Improving our targeted youth service (4 min read)

SfYP asked young people to tell them what was important to them in order to discover whether their services matched the support young people in Hertfordshire need.

August's blog cover image Study Plus (4 min read)

Find out from past graduates how enrolling on to a Study Plus course could help give you the freedom and tools you need to make decisions about your future.

An illustration of a young man sitting at a bus stop. The image has been taken from the Travel and Transport page and is being used as the cover image for September's blog. The date "16 Sep" is printed on the illustration. Preparing for Adulthood - improving our online content (4 min read)

Read about how we recently made it our mission to review and refresh, alongside parents, young people and professionals of Hertfordshire, our Preparing for adulthood webpages and find out what we achieve.

Creating a Local Offer that's more personal to you (6 min read)

We are constantly exploring new ways to improve the Local Offer, here's what we are working on now.

An image from our June blog of a child's drawing Resources area revisited (2 min read)

As things begin to settle down and schools start to reopen, our website data is showing that our resources area still remains our most popular webpage on the Local Offer.

Guest blog: Capturing the voices of young people (3 min read)

Services for Young People, our youth service, tells us how they have been listening to young people of all abilities.

Person reviewing a letter about the EHCP

Guest blog: Improving EHCP letters (4 min read)

Our content writers have been changing the way we communicate with families who are going through the EHCP process.

17-Apr-megaphone-600x400 Resources area goes live (4 min read)

The resources area is a place that families can rely on for up-to-date, practical support for any stage of their child's development.

13 Nov - Rewriting the local offer

Guest blog: Co-producing the rewrite of the Local Offer website (3 min read)

Sylvia Jenkins, Parent Rep for HPCI - shares her experience co-producing improvements to the information on the Local Offer website.

9 Dec new Local Offer homepage

We have launched our test site - Tell us what you think (4 min read)

We launched our new website in a test area, to collect feedback and make improvements before the full launch in January.

28 Jan Launch event

The Local Offer website launch event (10 min read)

We've put a snapshot of our drop-in day together, including videos and resources from some of the workshops that were run.

Boy and teacher doing crafts

Guest blog: improving specialist advice and support (2 min read)

We're asking for your thoughts on how we can make our special advice and support service work better for you.

11 Sep look and feel blog

The Local Offer website is changing... (2 min read)

Based on your feedback, we're working on a new look and feel for the Local Offer website.

4 Oct SENDIASS blog

Guest blog: SENDIASS (2 min read)

Hertfordshire's SEND Information, Advice and Support Service talks to us about the improvements they are making to reach more families.

6 June workers post

Guest blog: Contacting workers (2 min read)

How we're making it quicker for parents of children or young people with SEND to contact their key workers by phone.

18 Jun Parent interview post

Parent interviews (10 min read)

We spoke to 27 parents of children with SEND in Hertfordshire to gain an understanding of the challenges they face. Here's what we learned...

4 Jul Communicating Post

Guest blog: communicating change

How can we communicate the changes we’re making to SEND services effectively?

8 MayStructure post

Building a better structure (4 min read)

Why is a good website structure so important?

16 May Measuring success psot

Measuring success (4 min read)

How will we know if we've made things faster or easier for our visitors?

20 May whats next post

What's next? (2 min read)

Now the 'discovery' phase of the project has ended, what are we doing next with all the information?

24 April start here post

Start here (2 min read)

How we're starting to improve things online for families and children with SEND...

25 Apr Data post

Data wrangling (2 min read)

We're using data as one measure to track how the website is improving...

29 April Improvements post

Turning research into improvements (15 min read)

We spent 3 months talking to families and professionals. Here's what we learned...

Page was last updated on: 02/12/2024 14:08:21

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