Engagement
10 Collaborative work and coproduction
The SEND Local Offer Team and wider members of the SEND Team at the Council have a strong working relationship with Southend SEND Independent Forum (SSIF), the Department for Education funded parent carer forum for Southend.
The SEND Local Offer team also have positive relationships with a number of other community organisations.
The following collaborative pieces of work have been undertaken within the SEND Team:
- The SEND Team and other members of the Southend SEND Partnership including SSIF worked closely to develop the draft send strategy, plan the strategy consultation and analyse the results from the consultation. This included a number of sessions worked over the summer holiday period.
- The guide Southend SEND: What happens next. A Graduated Response to Special Educational Needs and Disabilities was co-designed.
- A number of changes were made to the "I am a parent carer" information page following a session in May 2022 to review the page.
- Parent carer surveys were developed for the Annual Review and Education, Health and Care Needs Assessment process to replace the POET survey which was previously used.
- Through engagement with young people with SEND, a survey for young people about the annual review process has been developed.
- A Guide to Making Universal Services more accessible was coproduced with the Local Offer Review Group (LORG) overseeing its development. This was finalised in October 2021.
- The Co-Production Charter was co-produced with members of LORG, other parents and organisations, facilitated by Jessica Russell, the Southend Co-Production Champion. The Charter will be finalised in 2023.
- LORG fed back that the Preparing for Adulthood sections of the Local Offer were not detailed enough. Representatives from the group worked on ensuring that a number of Information, Advice and Guidance pages were updated, and some new services added. As a result, 5 new Information advice and guidance pages were added along with 5 new service pages. Pages for each of the 3 Colleges were also created to specifically show their SEND provision, including Apprenticeships.
- LORG also fedback that there was insufficient information for parents around the EHC needs assessment process and Education Health and Care Plans on the local offer website. As a result changes to the way pages were presented, links to other pages and the language used in the information were updated. Additional pages were created or updated to ensure information was consistent, linked to and provide information on other related topics. A total of 11 pages underwent review and amendment for LORG sign off.
11. Community engagement
The SEND Local Offer team regularly attend community events to:
- gain feedback about the experiences of SEND families so this can be fed back to management.
- raise awareness of the SEND Local Offer.
- answer questions about SEND services and processes.
- advise on how people can keep up to date with news and developments via the e-newsletter and our social media channels.
In the latter part of 2021 and the first quarter of 2022, opportunities to attend events were greatly reduced due to COVID restrictions. Since April 2022 when face to face events were re-introduced, members of the SEND Local Offer team have attended 52 events at a variety of locations. These are listed in section 13.
Based on feedback from families, the SEND Local Offer team are supporting further community engagements and increasing visibility of the SEND Team.
Families wanted to hear directly from the SEND Team and have opportunities to ask questions and understand processes in obtaining support. In response to this monthly SEND Surgeries were introduced in November 2022. See section 16 for further details.
Your Local Offer, Your Way sessions have also been introduced to provide opportunities for young people with SEND, parent carers and professionals to give feedback on information they need on the Local Offer and to provide opportunities to co-produce. See section 15 for details.
Attendance at events has:
- raised awareness of opportunities for service users to have their say and give feedback on the SEND strategy consultation and through the annual review and education, health and care needs assessment survey.
- raised awareness of the SEND Local Offer pages on Livewell, the SEND e-newsletter and the social media channels as sources of information with both parent carers and other professionals working in the local area.
- made parent carers aware of the graduated approach document and the duties of education settings to support children and young people with SEND.
- made the SEND team more visible and developed relationships between parent carers and community organisations.
- raised awareness of the EHC Hub; at some events, parent / carers have been given support on how to use the Hub to find information about their child.
- enabled the SEND Local Offer team to tell parent carers and professionals about local services and support that could help them.
12. Children and Young People forum and activity
The Southend SEND Youth Forum was created in September 2021 for young people aged between 11 and 25 years who have special educational needs or disabilities (SEND).
The forum supports young people to:
- express their views.
- influence services they use.
- identify gaps in things they want to do.
- help to develop new things and services.
- raise the profile and awareness of SEND.
- represent other young people with SEND.
The forum currently has 15 members, from 5 different education settings. 3 joint meetings have been held to date, involving 8 education settings overall. In February 2022, several members of the forum attended the Council for Disabled Children's annual youth conference.
In April and May 2022, 18 young people provided their feedback on the annual review process. From this, draft questions for an annual review survey for young people were developed. These were reviewed by 23 young people with SEND, which led to the final set of questions. The survey will be launched in January 2023. This will include a video created by and for young people and a guide to the annual review process with tips and hints from young people.
Young people are keen to be involved in creating information for the Local Offer to help raise awareness about different SEND conditions, and a member of the forum has started to produce some material.
We are very keen to build the forum so that young people can have an active role in telling us what matters to them and get involved in a range of projects. The SEND Local Offer Team have started meeting with education settings who are not currently involved in the forum to tell them about the forum and to discuss how their students can get involved. The Local Offer volunteer, a young person with SEND himself, is taking an active role in this and has also spoken to some other Local Authority youth forum groups to see how it is working in their area and what could be developed in Southend.
13. Events attended by the SEND Local Offer Team in 2022
April: 3 events
- City SENCo Cluster
- SEND Young Persons Forum - meeting focused on development of an annual review survey for young people at South Essex College
- SEND Young Persons Forum - meeting focused on development of an annual review survey for young people at Westcliff High School for Girls
May: 5 events
- Elective Home Education networking event
- Visit to Lancaster School (introduction)
- Visit to Kingsdown School (introduction)
- Visit to The St. Christopher School (introduction)
- LORG working group
June: 7 events
- SAVS networking event
- SSIF coffee morning
- Visit to Little Heroes
- Visit to Leigh on Sea SEND Families
- Visit Trustlinks Westcliff (introduction)
- Graduated Approach Event
- Early Years Cluster Meeting. Networking event
July: 10 events
- SEND Consultation sessions at The Tickfield Centre and online
- Visit to Little Heroes
- Young people engagement event at Trustlinks - 1 person
- SSIF coffee morning
- Elective Home Education and Alternative Provision event
- Partnership SEND consultation event
- Play and Development group at Summercourt Family Centre
- Small Kids, Big Ideas session
- Friars Family Centre Funday
- Trust Links Summer Fayre
August: 3 events
- Summercourt Family Centre Fun Day - 30 people
- St. Christopher's Family Day.
- Little Heroes Garons Park event
September: 5 events
- SSIF coffee morning
- Early Years stay and play session
- Your Local Offer, Your Way (in-person) - 6 attendees
- Your Local Offer, Your Way (online) - 0 attendees
- City SENCO meeting
October: 7 events
- Southend Family Centre Networking event
- ABSS Introduction
- SSIF Coffee Morning
- Little Heroes session
- SAVS networking brunch
- Communities networking event
- SEND the Right Message coffee morning
- Southend Council staff neurodivergence forum
November: 11 events
- Ward Panel Meeting - Hamstel Family Centre
- SSIF Coffee Morning
- Southend Communities Event
- Southend Annual Schools Conference for SEND
- Southend Governor and Headteacher Conference
- Little Heroes session
- SEND Surgery
- EHC Hub feedback sessions for parent carers and practitioners
- Your Local Offer Your Way (online session)
- Your Local Offer, Your Way (in-person session)
- SEND Stay and Play session
- Visit to Wellbeing at Garon Park
December: 2 events
- SEND Surgery
- Southend Council staff neurodivergence forum