When you apply for an assessment of your child's need to see if they qualify for an education, health and care plan (EHCP), a panel that includes our Deputy Principal Educational Psychologist (DPEP) make a decision whether or not to assess.
If the decision is made to asses your child's needs, this is the process of our involvement, although it will look slightly different for each child.
When the decision to assess your child's needs is made
- Our Deputy Principal Educational Psychologist (DPEP) reads all of the information received as part of your EHC application.
- Based on this, they make a suggestion about how much EP involvement they feel is needed during your child's assessment of need, and assign an EP to you.
An EP is assigned to you and a plan is agreed
- Your assigned EP reads the information and advices from your application, to consider if they agree with the DPEP's suggestions. The EP is able to decide on a different route if they feel it is needed.
- Your EP will speak to you to explain their planned approach to involvement in your child's assessment of need, and describe the activities that will take place.
- You will be asked to give your consent to the plans; you have a right to not consent if you wish. If you are not happy with the suggested approach, you can work with your EP to agree a different plan.
What our involvement may include
- We decide on the level of our involvement based on what evidence and advice you have already from other professionals.
- If you have worked a lot with the SEND specialist advisory service already, for example, we may not need to meet your child, because we can use their detailed information to base our advice on.
- For more complex cases, we may have more involvement.
EP involvement is carried out and the advices are shared
- You, your SEN Officer, and your school will receive the agreed advices from your EP.
- The advices will differ for every child, so that in each process, we deliver quality advice that addresses their individual needs and includes specific, goal based outcomes.
We provide support for educational settings following critical incidents such as the serious injury or unexpected death of a child, member of staff, parent or carer. Once aware of the incident, response to the educational setting is within one working day.