Changing for the Better –
The Oxfordshire Experience
Simon Adams
Oxfordshire
•155,700 (0-19) children and young people.
•234 primary schools, 34 secondary schools, 13 special
schools and 1 PRU
•Contrasts:
–Oxfordshire is the most rural county in the South
East region. Over 50% of people in Oxfordshire live in
settlements of less than 10,000 people.
–There are ten areas within the bottom ten per cent
of all areas in England with high child poverty
–Three of the five Districts score in the top ten per
cent of affluence nationally
Where We Were
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“Stalinist” approach to SEN
Bureaucratic
Wasteful use of resources
Mistrusted
Unfair
Opaque
Unknowing
What Were We Doing?
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Investing in ICT and data e.g.SIMS,EMS,
Reshaping SEN services
Linking with other agencies
Adopting an area approach
Reducing out-county places
Retaining special schools, widening their role
and creating consistency in admissions
Reducing transport costs
Reinvesting in services and schools
What Did We Want?
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Fairness
Embedded inclusive values
Resources linked to need
Early intervention
Flexibility of response
Expert advice to teachers
Parental and school confidence
and… effective financial management
A Change of Authority Culture
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No instant miracle cures
Clarity of values and purpose
Efficiency and effectiveness
Acquiring, cleaning and using data
Consistency, openness and fairness
Involvement, challenge and support
Letting go – decisions and resources
What Do Statements Provide?
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Multi-professional information and
guidance on a child’s needs
Targeted resources for individuals
Parental confidence and security
A requirement for special schools
But …
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All that information is available without a Statement
The resources can be available without delay and for
all children with SEN
Services can be linked to need not bureaucracy
Parental confidence can be secured by the school and
the knowledge that a Statement is available
Around 90% of assessments were requested by
schools not parents
LA maintains ultimate legal responsibility but schools
actually educate children, not LAs
And..
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The very existence of Statements marks out
children as different – it is not inclusive
There is an artificial divide between those
with and those without Statements
Statements can contribute to certain children
being seen as someone else’s responsibility
Funds residing with central authorities impose
a barrier to schools meeting needs
Low correlation between Statements and SEN
So Statements…
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Aren’t fair,
Aren’t effective
Are bureaucratic and costly
Waste SENCO and service time
Leave educational decisions to bureaucrats
Hamper effective school level decisions
Don’t match resources to need
And are are rigid and restrictive
A Reminder
“Trusting the professional judgement of
teachers is at the core of, and essential to,
the efficient tackling of SEN”
“Decisions on spending should be taken at
the lowest possible level”
“In no area is (the) commitment to
excellence and equality of opportunity more
important than in the area of SEN and
inclusion”
National (English!) Picture
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Statutory Assessment and Statements of SEN
in Need of Review? Audit Commission 2002
LEA Strategy for the Inclusion of of Pupils with
SEN. Ofsted 2002
Reducing Reliance on Statements. An
Investigation into LA Practice and Outcomes.
Anne Pinney (for DfES) 2003
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Removing Barriers to Achievement. DfES 2004
Reducing Reliance on
Statements
“Explore, with schools, the delegation of
the statementing budget in order to
ensure practical support is available to
meet children’s needs as quickly and
flexibly as possible”
Oxfordshire SEN Strategy 2004
Key Elements
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“With schools”
“Budget delegation”
“Practical support”
“Quickly and flexibly”
Not…
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Doing to schools
Cutting budgets
Removing support
Being cumbersome or rigid
What We Did
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Built on accepted approaches
Improved LA practice
Encouraged confidence through
openness
Innovated together
Listened and responded
Shared aspirations
The Working Group
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Governors, unions, heads, officers,
advisors, EPs, Parent Partnership
Agreed aims and principles
Opened the books to scrutiny
Created a huge range of models
Produced innumerable drafts
Consulting
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Informal/formative consultation to
engage key parties and encourage
feedback
Briefings and workshops – politicians,
parents, teachers, heads, governors
Refined, rethought and redrafted
The Model
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Delegate most/all the Statementing
budget to secondary schools
Delegate much of the Statementing
budget to primary schools
Maintain the existing criteria for
statutory assessment
Retain and strengthen SEN Services
The SEN Index
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A measure of socio-economic
deprivation* - 30%
School assessment of SEN (SEN
registers) - 30%
A measure of attainment of school
intake - 40% (End of key stage 1 and 2
results).
* includes Children in Public Care or with English as an Additional
Language (EAL).
Socio-economic Measure
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All pupils traced, via postcodes, to areas of
300 to 400 houses.
Each area has an Income Deprivation
Affecting Children Index (IDACI), based on
factors such as the number of families
receiving income support.
From this an overall score for the school is
calculated.
The formula also includes a small element for
EAL and in Public Care.
School Assessment Of SEN
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Schools provide total number on SEN register.
SEN registers are checked against previously
submitted data.
Analysed against the other two elements of the
index (which have a very strongly correlation).
Where SEN registers fall outside the expected level,
which may be for perfectly valid reasons, schools are
contacted.
If necessary, follow up visits take place.
Pupil Attainment
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For primary schools the KS1 performances for
reading, writing and maths in the previous summer
are converted to points and averaged.
For secondary schools the performance at key stage
2 is used: English, maths and science are pointed
and averaged.
The resultant scores are ranked and the lowest 10%
of pupils weighted at 2 points. The next 10% are
given 1 point and the remaining 80% are given zero.
As a one-year score is volatile scores are averaged
over a number of years.
Applying The Index
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Secondary Schools Funding for all pupils with SEN,
including those with statements, is delegated to
secondary schools using the SEN Index.
Primary Schools For most primary schools funding is
delegated to provide up to 15 TA hours p.w. or
equivalent.
Small Primary Schools For the hundred primary
schools with the smallest whole school budgets, funding
equivalent to 5 hours of additional provision is delegated.
Top-up Funding
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Funding is retained centrally to top–up provision for
individual pupils in primary schools with needs
beyond the provision already delegated to schools.
Top-up funding is considered by a panel of heads
officers and services when a statement is being
drawn up or following an annual review. For small
primary schools, a request may be made for
additional funding.
Clear, agreed evidence on use of existing delegated
funding is then considered by a panel of heads,
officers, Senior EP, SEN service managers
What Is Expected Of Schools?
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Provide for all their pupils’ needs from
delegated funds (plus top-ups in primary
schools)
Maintain and review plans and provision in
line with the SEN Code of Practice
Carry out self evaluation audit at least three
yearly but usually annually
Maintain SEN register as part of SIMS school
data and allow electronic collection by the LA
What Is Expected Of The LA?
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Top-up funding for primary age pupils
Provision of special school places, as appropriate
Continue to monitor school performance
Provide free SEN specialist service advice,
training and, where appropriate, in school
teaching/support e.g VI and HI
Comply with legislation on existing Statements
Carry out statutory assessments where requested
Provide feedback to schools on data collected
Monitoring
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The LA has a statutory duty to monitor the use of
resources delegated to schools for SEN.
An annual inclusion profile is provided for every
school containing contextual, resources and progress
data on vulnerable pupils.
This information is used to prioritise schools for
further support to help raise achievements of
vulnerable pupils and to safeguard their rights and
entitlements.
On a three yearly cycle all schools are supported, by
officers and advisors, with their Inclusion Selfevaluation (From Audit to Action).
Did It Work?
Children with Statements Maintained by Oxfordshire
2653
Statement Numbers
2551
2550
2540
2500
2427
2502
2281
2126
2047
2000
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
Year
2007
2008
2009
2010
Statutory Assessments
Number of Incomplete Assessments on Count Day Each Month
200
150
Number of
Incomplete
Assessments on
Count Day Each
Month
100
50
41
37
33
29
25
21
17
13
9
5
1
0
Number of Assessments
2005-2008
TOTALS
350
300
250
200
150
TOTALS
100
50
0
1
2
3
4
Were Parents Satisfied?
Numbers of Tribunals
35
30
30
25
20
17
13
15
10
8
8
5
0
2005/06
2006/07
2007/08
Academic Year
2008/09
2009/10
Outcomes
•Delegation of all statement funding for secondary schools and partial for
primary schools with:
– Greater autonomy for schools
– Strengthening of self evaluation and monitoring procedures
– Reduced bureaucracy increased school time and funding
– Central SEN services retained
•Performance measures and outcomes remain good:
– Tribunals remain low compared with statistical neighbours and nationally
– Inclusion in mainstream is high
– Very low user of out county/area placements
– Improved pupil performance
•School level review of all delegated SEN funding resulted in:
- head teachers agreeing to not increase the overall delegated funding
External Evidence
“Overall it was very difficult to find differences in the way
the children where treated with and without statements.
Children were regularly reviewed whether they had a
statement or were on School Action Plus and had similar
access to interventions and support. Similarly, parent
feedback was not distinguishable between the two
groups”.
Oxford Brookes University Research Study for the Lamb Enquiry 2009
Other Judgements
•100% of statements completed within 26 weeks, with
and without exceptions
•Regional Adviser describes Oxfordshire as having
‘very good practice in terms of SEN systems and
budget management’.
•Identified ‘as an area where good practice has been
developed in managing SEN/AEN resources and
using data to measure impact’. Audit Commission
2009
• OFSTED judged 65% of schools good or
outstanding in SEN
OFSTED
“How effective, efficient and
inclusive is the provision of
education, integrated care and any
extended services in meeting the
needs of learners?”
OFSTED Overall Effectiveness Judgement
Time To Think Again?
“There is no correlation between the socioeconomic profile of LAs and the level of
Statements. However there is a strong link
between the socio-economic profile and the
proportion of pupils with SEN overall. This
confirms the link between SEN and
deprivation, but points to the influence of
local policy on statementing practice”.
Reducing Reliance on Statements – Anne Pinney 2003
..and finally…
You can't motivate people to do things, you
can only demotivate them. The primary job
of the manager is not to empower but to
remove obstacles.
S. Adams*
*Scott Adams