Anyone with a child at an Academy? What's it all about?

[Moonlight]

Ourmaminhavana, I hope you don't mind me asking but why will your school now opt out of providing SEN? Does it come down to funding and what will happen to the children already on the SEN register? Will the school now turn future children away that require more support? Sorry to ask so many questions but academies will affect us all at some point and it's better to get a 'balanced picture' from people who are already experiencing these changes whether they be good or bad.

[aargh]

All schools are obliged to provide for SEN. It is not something they can opt out of.

I don't know exactly how SEN funding will work in academies, but a problem might arise if the central resources LEAs provide are undermined by the scheme.
Currently individual schools allocate a portion of their budget to cover SEN, but the LEA will provide extra funds if a child has a statement that indicates they need more support than can be covered.

For example, one of my pupils has a physical disability which means she needs physical assistance throughout the day. The LEA give us extra funding to pay a full time TA to attend these needs.

The school will provide evidence of the child's need. The LEA write the statement of SEN. The school and the LEA negotiate over what funding the LEA will provide and for how many hours the child needs extra support. This system leads to some cases where the LEA are reluctant to write a statement because they haven't the funds to give. Some Children lose out.

If the LEA role is diminished once all schools become academies, there would have to be some other way of determining a child's statement of SEN and allocation of funding from somewhere. Another part of the LEA role in SEN is provision of peripatetic specialists who visit pupils analysing their needs, monitoring their progress (and the support the school is providing) and advising on how the school can help the child further. This is not something each school can provide for itself.

This is one of the issues that IMHO the Gov have not thought through.

[ourmaminhavana]

Sorry for the confusion, it's not that my school will opt out of SEN provision, rather at the moment all schools- as I understand it- pay into a general county council fund. My school is a high achieving grammar school with few SEN students and we will gain as we will no longer be paying for a service which we don't utilise, but there will be less money in the general kitty.
I also know of a local comprehensive that has recently adopted academy status and has cut SEN funding hugely. A friend's severely autistic child used to have, I think, almost continual 1 to 1 support and this has been reduced to 10 hours.

[aargh]

I also know of a local comprehensive that has recently adopted academy status and has cut SEN funding hugely. A friend's severely autistic child used to have, I think, almost continual 1 to 1 support and this has been reduced to 10 hours.

That's sort of the point I was making, because LEAs provide extra funds and support when they write a statement but if an academy is out of LEA auspices they are no longer obliged to do this. 10 hours is the standard support, budget-wise, that the LEA expect the school to contribute. What it looks like is the school has been unable to make up the difference contributed by the LEA. To get the extra back, yon school would have to negotiate with the Government.

gh achieving grammar school with few SEN students and we will gain as we will no longer be paying for a service which we don't utilise

I should hope they all have SEN. SEN are at both ends of the spectrum (though most people forget this). Primaries all have gifted and talented provision for the SEN of their most able pupils. We have had 2 pupils recently bumped into the year group above their actual age. In my DS's school, he and 4 other bright year 4s work in the year 5 class.
Secondaries stream. If yon Grammar DCs are all extremely brilliant they have SEN. It is being provided for by their attendance at Grammar This is one of the reasons some districts still HAVE grammars at all.

The money all comes from the same place. The academy status is just the Gov adjusting who decides what to do with it. If it is an LEA controlled school the LEA is handing the school money not vice versa. If it is an academy they would be getting their Gov money direct then, as you say, have to pay the LEA for services they need.

[Jiff]

Thanks Etienne and Aargh - very interesting.

[Moonlight]

aargh, you seem very knowledgeable on the subject of academies, so I have a question which I am hoping you will be able to answer. As I have previously mentioned, TUPE will protect existing employees with pay and conditions but what about employer's contribution to pensions? My limited understanding of it is that employers will still have to make a contribution to employees' pension funds but they do not have to keep paying the same contribution as is currently provided by the LEA. In effect, these contributions could decrease dramatically or they could increase further but I think this is highly unlikely. Thanking you in advance of your help.

[aargh]

As I have previously mentioned, TUPE will protect existing employees with pay and conditions but what about employer's contribution to pensions? My limited understanding of it is that employers will still have to make a contribution to employees' pension funds but they do not have to keep paying the same contribution as is currently provided by the LEA. In effect, these contributions could decrease dramatically or they could increase further but I think this is highly unlikely. Thanking you in advance of your help.

Had to consult DH on this (he used to manage the local CAB). He says:-

"I have to give a health warning as it is a couple of years since I worked in the CAB so the law may have changed. A further caveat is that the TUPE regulations were adopted by the British government under protest in order to comply with European law, which was done largely by copying the regulations of another country (I forget which) that included concepts alien to English law. As a result TUPE has ben subject to frequent legal cases to establish exactly what it means. BUT having said all that the basic point of TUPE is that if it applies, employees retain all their contractual rights. So, if the pension contributions are specified in the contract, they should remain the same. If they aren't in the contract, I don't think TUPE or anything else prevents a change. But even if TUPE covers you, there is nothing to stop the employer [whether or not there has been a TUPE situation] seeking to change ["vary" in legalese] the terms of the contract. Theoretically this requires the agreement of both employer and employee, but it is tricky if the employer maintains that they simply cannot afford to keep employees on without making the contractual changes, especially if they then threaten to sack anyone who won't agree to the changes. The employee then has to either accept the change, or risk being sacked. Having been sacked the employee can take the employer to an Employment Tribunal for unfair dismissal but there is at risk of the tribunal agreeing that the employer had no choice and therefore deciding the dismissal is fair either on grounds of redundancy or of what is called "other substantially fair reason". Even if the tribunal thinks the dismissal is unfair, this gets you some money but still leaves you out of work in the middle of a recession. In practice the best defence is either a tough and effective trade union willing to threaten either industrial or mass legal action against contract changes, or to be so valuable to your employer that they don't want to start a fight with you."

[Moonlight]

aargh, thank you so much for your quick reply and, of course, your DH! You were most helpful.