Posted on behalf of Marcus Warnes (Accountable Officer for the six Staffordshire CCGs, and Helen Riley, Deputy Chief Executive & Director for Families & Communities) Staffordshire County Council:
In January 2022, Ofsted and the Care Quality Commission re-visited Staffordshire to follow up on the Local Area Review that took place in November 2018.
The full report highlighting the inspectors’ findings can be downloaded here.
The reinspection of the service, which is commissioned and delivered by the county council, schools, and Staffordshire NHS Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs), found improvements in six out of eight areas under review.
However, inspectors said that more work still needs to be done to improve both the relationships with families and the content of Education Health and Care Plans (EHCPs).
What we are doing:
We know we can do better, and we have big ambitions for children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) and want to see them thrive.
Over the next 12 months, we will be working hard to make improvements to the SEND services in Staffordshire.
We have already increased the number of staff who draft the EHCP reports by a quarter and have allocated funding to allow teaching staff in each borough and district to devote more time to SEND.
Additionally, practical changes include developing the recently launched Parent Carer Forum to identity problems and find solutions more quickly and working on a national pilot scheme with the Council for Disabled Children to measure the impact of the changes being made.
What is next?
Ofsted and the Care Quality Commission will be returning to Staffordshire in early 2023 to assess the progress we have made.
For more information about the Staffordshire SEND Local Area Review, please click here.
