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Robert Bloomfield

The Local Offer (Central Beds)

What is the Local Offer?

The Local Offer website is a ‘one stop shop’ for all local SEND advice, guidance, and support services in Central Beds.  It has been redesigned and co-produced with SNAP Parent Carer Forum (SNAP PCF), an independent forum of parents and carers of SEND children in Central Bedfordshire, as well as education, health and social care professionals, parents, carers, children and young people with SEND.

As part of the redesign process, the Council listened to and incorporated feedback from families and young people to make it more engaging, easier to navigate and to ensure it contains more relevant information.  Website visitors will be signposted to important information including:

  • Sources of support, advice and information for children, young people and families, including supporting groups and forums
  • Arrangements to identify and assess children and young people with SEND, including how an assessment can be requested
  • Other educational provision, for example, leisure activities, sports and arts provision
  • Information about provision to assist in preparing children and young people for adulthood including post-16 education and training
  • Arrangements for travel to and from school, post-16 settings and early year providers
  • Childcare, including suitable provision for disabled children and those with SEND
  • Health and development needs of children from when they are born through to when they transition into adulthood
  • Support available to young people in higher education, particularly the Disabled Students Allowance (DSA) and the process and timescales for making an application for DSA.

Central Bedfordshire Council: Local Offer

https://Localoffer.centralbedfordshire.gov.uk

 

SEND team

Assistant director

Peter Fraser, Assistant Director for Education (responsible for the statutory SEND team)

Heads of service for special educational needs and disabilities (SEND)

  • Simon Cotton: education and inclusion (south area)
  • Jackie Edwards: education and inclusion (north area)

Statutory SEND team managers

  • Joe Watts SEND Team Manager Complex Cases
  • Rebecca Fossey SEND Team Manager (south area)
  • Emily Stirling SEND Team Manager (north area)

The Local Offer is for:

  • Children and young people with SEN and/or disabilities from birth to 25 
  • Their parents and carers 
  • Practitioners and professionals

very child or young person with an education, health and care plan (EHCP) in Central Bedfordshire will have an allocated SEND officer and senior SEND officer who will be the point of contact and responsible for carrying out statutory duties and processes relating to the EHCP. The allocated SEND officer and senior SEND officer is determined by which school or setting the child or young person attends. Where a child or young person lives in Central Bedfordshire but does not attend a school listed on the contact sheet below, the allocated SEND officer and senior SEND officer will be determined by the home address.

View or download list of SEND officers (PDF)

Files linked from this page may not be suitable for users of assisted technology. If you need an accessible version, please email send.feedback@centralbedfordshire.gov.uk.

Contact CBC SEND team

Telephone: 0300 300 8356
Emailstatass@centralbedfordshire.gov.uk

 

What the CBC team does

Our SEND team is responsible for carrying out statutory duties and processes linked to education, health and care plans (EHCPs) for children and young people with SEND aged up to 25. The team works with children, young people, parents and professionals to co-produce education, health and care plans and agreeing provision and educational placement.

Other duties include:

  • receipt and decision-making regarding requests for EHC needs assessments
  • gathering information during the EHC needs assessment
  • co-ordination and writing of EHCPs
  • monitoring of annual reviews (please note: the team's attendance is not a statutory requirement)
  • processing of annual review documentation
  • consulting with schools and supporting school admissions for pupils with an EHCP
  • preparation of cases for our SEND panels and providing feedback to parents and settings
  • case management and work regarding SEN tribunals (SENDIST)
  • providing advice to schools, parents and professionals regarding statutory processes
  • facilitation of training regarding statutory processes for professionals and parents

Please note: it is not the role of our SEND team to provide an advisory or outreach service regarding individual cases or to recommend suitable provision or school placement. A list of advisory services available to parents and settings in Central Bedfordshire can be found on our Family information Directory.

The local offer can help you to find out more about the support and services:

• your child can get

• you can get

Your local offer will tell you:

• who to contact to find out more information

• how to contact them

You can find your local offer on your local council’s website. If you do not have access to the Internet, you can ask your local council or your local information advice and support service for information that is written down.

Your local offer will tell you what services and support you can get.

This will include information for you and your child about:

• schools and colleges

• transport

• support to get a job, like training

• support with taking part in sport and other activities

• local groups, like parent carer forums

• how your child will be assessed to see what support they need.

Every local council will have its own local offer. This will be different in every area.

 

From the CBC Website

(RBA is not responsible for the upkeep of links from the CBC website) 

  1. SEND services(this page)
  2. What to do if you think your child has special educational needs or disabilities (SEND)
  3. Annual reviews of EHC plans for children and young people with special educational needs (SEN)
  4. Transitions 14-25 years
  5. Four broad categories of special educational needs and/or disability (SEND)
  6. SEND panels in Central Bedfordshire

SEND services

Head of Special Educational Needs and Disability: Louise Bartos

Louise joined us in April 2018, having previously worked at Buckinghamshire County Council and Milton Keynes Council. She's worked within special educational needs (SEN) since 2002.

Louise manages our educational psychology team, early years team, special educational needs team and the visual impaired, hearing impaired and medical needs team.

The managers for the below teams are as followed:

  • Dewi Hughes – Principal Educational Psychologist
  • Barbara Bourn – Early Years SEND Manager
  • Joe Watts – SEND Manager
  • Kevin Ward – Hearing Impaired Team Leader
  • Judith Seamarks – Visual Impaired Team Leader (Head Teacher)
  • Heather Anderson – Medical Team Leader (Head Teacher)

All the teams work in one of the localities linked to an educational setting. Our five localities are:

  • Dunstable
  • Houghton Regis
  • Leighton Buzzard
  • Ivel Valley (includes Arlesey, Stotfold, Biggleswade, Shefford and surrounding areas)
  • West Mid Beds (includes Ampthill, Flitwick and surrounding areas)

You can find out who your allocated educational psychologist, SEND team, and early years representative is by the links below.

Please note that this information regularly changes, and we will ensure that these contact details are frequently updated.

Since Louise has been here she has been working with her teams to improve the outcomes of Children and young people with SEND. This ensuring that we have the right support at the right time. A self-evaluation framework (SEF) has been completed. This is an overview of the strengths and areas for development for our collective response for children with special educational needs and/or disability (SEND) across Central Bedfordshire. 

For the last year, we've been running a project called Managing Demand in SEND and the focus has been to provide support to schools to help with early intervention. We have had 6 projects running offering individual support to children and schools and training to schools in the areas. The overall project finishes in March 2020 and we are currently working on developing toolkits for schools to continue to work with to ensure the staff can considered what support is right for the child young person. Find out more on our news page.

Louise meets with Kirsty Green, the director of SNAP Parent Carer Forum on a monthly basis and listens to feedback and what parents are asking for. From these meetings, a training programme has been offered to parents. This programme covers:

  • making my child’s EHC Plan work
  • EHC Annual Review
  • EHC Annual Review for Transfer pupils to another school
  • SEN Support
  • EHC Needs Assessment
  • making my EHC Plan work

All the above training has been run once this year and we have had positive feedback.

About our SEND services

Our SEND services consist of:

  • educational psychologists
  • Early Years SEND team
  • SEND team

The services provide support, guidance and advice to all educational settings, parents and professionals with regards to supporting children and young people with SEND.

Educational psychology services

An educational psychologist is someone trained to help children and young people (from 0 - 25) with their learning and development. All educational psychologists are registered with the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC).

Find out more about educational psychology

Early years SEND team

Our special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) early years team contains early years advisory teachers and specialist practitioners and it forms part of our special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) service. The team provides support to children with additional needs or who are disabled, their parents/carers and the settings they attend.

To ensure that your child receives the best support we can offer, we will complete an initial assessment with you and your child - either at home, if your child is not attending an early years setting (such as a nursery, or childminder), or in their early years setting.

We offer home visits and when your child is ready to access an early years setting, we will work with you and the setting to ensure a smooth transition, helping your child to settle successfully. We will continue to work with you, your child and their early years setting to build on your child's skills and encourage their progress in play, learning and communication.

We will work with you and your child's early years setting offering advice and guidance on all aspects of your child’s development, progress and future planning. We will help the setting to identify any additional support your child may need and we will help them to provide this. We work closely with other professionals some of whom your child may already be receiving support from such as physiotherapists or speech and language therapists. We will continue to work with your child until they transfer to school.

Referrals to our early years SEND team will be accepted from health and care professionals and special educational needs coordinators in early years settings.

Downloads

Contact us

Telephone: 0300 300 4364

Special educational needs and disability (SEND) team

The SEND team is responsible for carrying out statutory duties and processes linked to education, health and care plans (EHCPs) for children and young people with SEND aged 0-25. The team works with children, young people, parents and professionals to co-produce education, health and care plans and agreeing provision and educational placement.

Other duties of the team include:

  • receipt and decision-making regarding requests for EHC Needs Assessments
  • gathering information during the EHC Needs Assessment
  • co-ordination and writing of EHCPs
  • monitoring of annual reviews (please note: the team's attendance is not a statutory requirement)
  • processing of annual review documentation
  • consulting with schools and supporting school admissions for pupils with an EHCP
  • preparation of cases for our SEND panels and providing feedback to parents and settings
  • case management and work regarding SEN Tribunals (SENDIST)
  • providing advice to schools, parents and professionals regarding statutory processes
  • facilitation of training regarding statutory processes for professionals and parents

Contact us

Telephone: 0300 300 8356
Emailstatass@centralbedfordshire.gov.uk

Please note: it is not the role of our SEND team to provide an advisory or outreach service regarding individual cases or to recommend suitable provision or school placement. A list of advisory services available to parents and settings in Central Bedfordshire can be found on our Family information Directory.

Medical needs service

Our medical needs teaching service provides teaching and support for children and young people of statutory school age and on the roll of a school, who due to illness require suitable alternative arrangements for their education for the period of that illness.

Teaching is provided for pupils whose education is disrupted for an initial period exceeding three weeks, due to:

  • an illness or injury keeping the pupil away from school whilst recovering
  • an illness or injury requiring regular hospital attendance
  • a chronic condition that causes frequent absences from school
  • a mental illness requiring therapeutic support

The service provides high quality teaching, mainly in the three core subjects of maths, science and English, as a way of supporting reintegration back into school.

In the main, education takes place in a pupil's home environment. However, where the pupil is able, education takes place in other buildings and may be in small groups. Pupils remain on the roll of their school, and the medical needs teachers work in partnership with the school to ensure continuity and progression for the pupil, taking account of medical advice. Schools and the medical needs team support reintegration of pupils where the medical advice supports their readiness to return to school.

Referrals are made to the medical needs service from the pupil's school.

Contact us

Telephone: 0300 300 8038
Emailmedicalteam@centralbedfordshire.gov.uk

Hearing impairment service

The hearing impairment service supports children and young people with a hearing impairment from birth or identification of the hearing loss. Support is provided through home visits, alongside nursery and pre-school visits, and then on to your child's local school. We also manage three hearing impairment provisions, located within Toddington St George C of E School, Parkfields Middle School and Harlington Upper School, resulting in a deaf-friendly environment where hearing-impaired learners from 3-18 can thrive academically, emotionally and socially. Provision for hearing-impaired learners is not an "add-on", but a fully integrated provision, operating within a mainstream educational environment.

Support for children and young people attending a local school or pre-school is provided by a team of qualified Teachers of the Deaf working peripatetically across Central Bedfordshire. Support is provided following an initial referral from the child's audiology department. Additional support may also be provided by a qualified nursery nurse specialising in hearing impairment if required, who works alongside your child's Teacher of the Deaf. Our hearing impairment manager provides additional educational audiological support as required complementing your child's clinical audiological support.

View hearing impairment referral form

Contact us

Telephone: 0300 300 8038
Emailhearingteam@centralbedfordshire.gov.uk

Visual Impairment Service

The visual impairment service supports visually impaired children from age 0-19 who live in or go to school in Central Bedfordshire and who meet the South-East Region Special Educational Needs (SERSEN) criteria for visual impairment.

The team consists of two specialist teachers for visual impairment, two specialist teaching assistants and a resource officer, all of whom have completed Braille training. The team also employs a part-time resource assistant.

Most referrals to us are made by ophthalmologists or via local health services. The team maintains good links with eye consultants, mobility officers, orthoptists and qualified teachers of the visually impaired in Bedford, Luton and Dunstable. These links mean that they are usually informed about a child with a visual impairment soon after diagnosis.

Schools, pre-school groups, parents and carers can also make referrals to our team:

  1. download a referral form
  2. sign it
  3. send it, along with the reasons by email to visualteam@centralbedfordshire.gov.uk or by post to:
    Visual Impairment Service
    Central Bedfordshire Council
    Watling House
    Dunstable
    Bedfordshire
    LU6 1LF

Contact us

Telephone: 0300 300 8038
Emailvisualteam@centralbedfordshire.gov.uk

 

Other resources

  • Whole School SEND Consortium SEND Review Guides provides a suite of SEND review guides that will help you to evaluate and improve provision for children and young people with SEND in your school (guides can be downloaded at the bottom of the page)
  • SEND Gateway is an online portal offering education professionals free, easy access to high quality information, resources and training for meeting the needs of children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND)
  • Nasen: Focus on SEND Training – Focus on SEND training is a free course aiming to help teachers and educational practitioners working across the 0 – 25 years age range to develop high quality practice in order to better meet the needs of their learners with SEND
  • Nasen: Early Years SEND Resources offers a range of resources providing information on SEND topics, including webcasts, miniguides, focus on SEND training (structured course) and face-to-face training materials
  • mental health toolkit (PDF 3.9MB) – promotes emotional health, wellbeing and resilience using a whole school and college approach. The aim of this toolkit is to enable Central Bedfordshire schools/colleges to adopt a holistic approach to promoting emotional wellbeing for its pupils/ students and staff, which aligns with our Children and Young People’s Plan (2018-2021), available on the First Hand website
  • the Disability Matters website offers a range of free e-learning courses, training materials and resources
  • Central Bedfordshire’s PSHE Network provides schools and colleges with up to date resources and training opportunities, locally and nationally on topics such as health conditions and mental health and wellbeing
  • SEND Bitesize is a half termly bitesized e-briefing, offering you information in the areas of special education needs and disability. Your number one guide in SEND Written by teachers for teachers
  • definition of SEND need for school census

Post-16 providers

Find out about post-16 providers

Out-of-county providers

Find out more information on out-of-county providers

Deciding on an education setting

Find out about deciding on an education setting.

Local Safeguarding Children's Board (LSCB)

Find out more about the Local Safeguarding Children’s Board (LSCB)

Safeguarding

Find out more about how you can help to safeguard children

Legislation and statutory guidance

Find out more information on Legislation and Statutory Guidance relating to children/young people with SEND

If you have any queries regarding the information or documents on this page, please contact send.feedback@centralbedfordshire.gov.uk.