Lincolnshire's SEND and Alternative Provision Inclusion Plan

We aim to ensure across all aspects of our local area, we are ambitious for children and young people with SEND, have an accurate shared understanding of the needs of the children and young people in their area and are confident in our ability to create an environment in which effective practice and multi-agency working can flourish.  We aim to meet the needs of the most vulnerable children and young people without resorting to exclusions, ensuring that exclusion is seen as an undesirable outcome rather than a justifiable sanction so that every child or young people feels part of their local school community.  

What we have achieved so far

• Lincolnshire’s ladder of behavioural intervention is well established and provides a clear framework for schools to develop their own best practice for identifying the underlying cause of behaviour and implement effective early support and evidence based intervention
• Lincolnshire’s emotional based school avoidance (EBSA) pathway has been fully reviewed and strengthened in partnership with a wide range of stakeholders.  The strengthened pathway provides schools with clarity regarding EBSA, proactive early intervention and effective whole school systems and practices.  The improved toolkit provides a robust analytical framework for understanding the underlying issues, enabling a meaningful support plan to be put implemented.  The pathway is now fully electronic
• the support from the pupil reintegration team (PRT) continues to be highly regarded by schools with evidence of positive impact; 97% of schools were satisfied with the involvement of and experience with the PRT
• behaviour outreach support service (BOSS) was recommissioned and continues to build capacity, confidence and competence of school staff to identify the causative factors of pupils’ distressed behaviours through a range of support strategies, interventions and advice and guidance
• access to alternative provision is being expanded through commissioning of further providers alongside a £2.5m expansion to Springwell Lincoln that will increase capacity
• collaborative headteacher inclusion panel (CHIPS) are well established and embedded to provide a robust and supportive forum for schools. The forum fully utilises off-site directions and managed moves as part of early support and intervention.  The meetings continue to progress with a focus on sector lead developments
• termly multiagency specialist community lead panels are embedded to meet the needs of children and young people accessing specialist support in their community.  The panels are chaired by special school headteachers and consist of special school headteachers, health, social care, LPCF, SEND and any additional professional that may be working with the child or young person. The panel supports specialist settings to continue meeting the needs of children and young people in their community through sector lead recommendations, evidence based strategies and interventions and sharing of good practice
• Lincolnshire’s inclusion strategy has been launched.  This builds upon the transformation work that has taken place since 2021 and the previous high needs strategy.  Our strategic direction continues to support a social model of inclusion 
• an extensive workforce development programme has been rolled out that builds on whole school SEND through a tiered approach and includes specialist training for practitioners, dependent on their role. This has been rolled out to mainstream to support their ability to meet children and young people’s needs with further elements made available to parents, carers, and families
• Lincolnshire’s electronic hub has been launched for the processing of all EHC needs assessment requests.  Resulting in a more transparent assessment process for parents, carers and children and young people
• the SEND leadership project started in September 2023. This project works with a pre-selected list of maintained schools who have been identified as requiring guidance and specific learning to improve outcomes for children with SEND. The aim is to deliver training at all levels within he school, starting with senior leaders and CEOs, and working through to teachers and teaching assistants
• the quality assurance group (health) has implemented a continuous process of reflection, feedback, improvement and embedded learning through a coproduced audit tool (QAF) and implemented teaching sessions in response to emerging themes from the EHC process  
• the children and young people’s out of area treatment panel has been developed to determine responsibility of a health need that sits outside existing service core offers 
• Lincolnshire has commissioned positive regard, part of the Wellspring Academy trust, to support our secondary schools with embedding a relational approach to behaviour support to create inclusive, empathic cultures.  The support will focus on creating consistency of practice for supporting challenging behaviours that develops and builds on good practice already in place 
• the EHC process quality assurance group (health) lead and co-ordinate cycle of continuous review and improvement of health advice for the EHC process, via weekly audits using a quality assurance framework (QAF).  Summary audit findings are shared on a bi monthly basis at the SEND health committee to inform developments and next steps
• a children and young people’s key worker service has been developed and rolled out in Lincolnshire in line with national plans.  The key worker acts as independent advocate on behalf of those with a learning disability and autistic children and young people and their parents and carers, where there is a probability of admission to specialist mental health hospital.  Key workers are accessed through the local dynamic support registers (DSRs). This is used to query, challenge and improve the use of systems and processes, taking into consideration access to care, education and treatment reviews (CETRs), with the aim of preventing avoidable admissions to highly specialist mental health inpatient services

What we will do next

• the workforce development programme will be embedded across educational settings with further training added to continue to develop mainstream school’s ability to implement a robust graduated approach that will reduce the need to rely on specialist provision.  This will work collaboratively with the DfE commissioned whole school SEND support via the teaching school hub, which links into partnership and programmes with specialist providers across the county, to maximise positive impact
• a multi-agency working group of key stakeholders will review Lincolnshire’s ladder of behavioural intervention, with a key focus on strengthening early intervention and also the steps within the ladder to further strengthen their application by schools.  The work will develop the ladder to provide support for schools in relation to preventative whole school approaches and recognising initial early warning signs, along with a toolkit that demonstrates and shares the vast array of good practice seen across the county
• a joint multi-agency data dashboard will be developed by the LA and health partners to maximise the use of data to inform commissioning and to support the sharing of meaningful evidence regarding outcomes and the provision of services.  The child and young person voice data intelligence project will review and develop improved, processes to collate service user lived experience feedback and to have a robust dashboard of statistical and geographical information. This will compound existing data, identify gaps, and inform future commissioning activities
• as part of the next phase of Lincolnshire’s ongoing transformation work and the building communities of specialist provision strategy, the introduction of alternative provision within mainstream schools will be rolled out.  These will be created through the local partnership and will be part of our mainstream offer that is run by mainstream school as an integral part of their school.  The provision will provide personalised educational delivery across the curriculum to support children and young people as they progress through their educational journey and prepare for adulthood  
• children's continuing care and the children with disabilities (CWD) social care team will further develop collaborative working to ensure that children and young people with complex health and care needs receive the right support at the right time.  Current separate panels will be combined to form one overarching panel for shared cases  
• the children's integrated commissioning team (CICT), jointly funded by NHS Lincolnshire Integrated Care Board (ICB) and ourselves, will lead on a review of integrated assessment processes and support for children and young people with SEND to further strengthen joint decision making, accountability and drive better outcomes and experiences for both children and young people and their families   
• use of Lincolnshire’s electronic hub will be widened for completion of all annual reviews of EHC plans, further widening the transparent way of working and access to information for parent, carer and children and young people with an EHC plan   
• the SEND Health quality assurance panel will continue to be reviewed and developed in line with national best practice in a process of continual improvement and to maintain a high standard of report writing and clinicians understanding of SEND  
• the review of alternative provision will be completed.  This will highlight actions and steps to be taken to provide mainstream schools with the appropriate support that will ensure schools are only issuing permanent exclusions as a last resort
• further alternative provision will be developed with opportunities for schools to develop their own internal alternative provision. This will focus on a three tier approach as set out in the DfE’s SEND and AP improvement plan as these national plans progress   
• the children and young people’s key worker service will continue to work with partners to identify those at risk of admission earlier, and work so that needs are considered holistically, to deliver the right support in the community. Keyworkers continue to help children and young people with a learning disability, autistic children and young people and their parents and carers to be heard throughout their involvement with mental health crisis or inpatient services. They ensure they feel informed, supported, and happy with the agreed outcomes, plans, and delivery, throughout the young person’s recovery. This service is available for 0-25 years
• the EHC QAG is currently a pilot however its uptake and impact has been marked and will becoming a substantive process going forward.  Following a tribunal teaching event co-hosted by the ICB and LA, clinicians are now using the QAF to review their own report writing to ensure that it is in line with best practice.   The tribunal teaching session has now become a substantive addition to the SEND clinician training programme delivered by LIAISE (SENDIASS) on behalf of the ICB