External educational interventions - Find a freedom of information request

For the purposes of this FOI request, 'external educational interventions' are defined as the following:

Mentoring

Tutoring

EAL Support

Functional Skills Tutoring

Functional Skills Assessment

Study Skills (including attitude/wellbeing support)

An external educational intervention is support that is external to the primary mode of education; this includes interventions that are external to maintained schools, PRUs, special schools, etc.

Children and Young People in Care

1. The number of children and young people in care who receive external educational interventions each academic year, going from 2017/18 to 2021/22.

2. The number of children and young people in care who currently receive external educational interventions broken down into the following categories:

a. By age group, from age 4 to age 25.

b. Types of school attended (e.g. mainstream state, maintained special, non-maintained special, mainstream private, special private etc)

3. The funding spent by the Local Authority each academic year on providing external educational interventions to children and young people in care, going from 2017/18 to 2021/22.

4. Local Authority future spend expectations for the provision of external educational interventions to children and young people in care.

5. The number of children and young people in care who have SEND requirements, including children receiving SEND support and those with EHCPs.

6. When external educational interventions, such as tutoring, is required for children and young people in care;

a. Provider/s the local authority uses for this additional support

b. The number of young people referred to each provider

Children and Young People with SEND support/EHCP support

1. The number of children and young people with SEND requirements/EHCPs who receive external educational interventions each academic year, going from 2017/18 to 2021/22.

2. The number of children and young people with SEND requirements/EHCPs who currently require external educational interventions broken down into the following categories:

a. By age group, from age 4 to age 25.

b. Types of school attended (e.g. mainstream state, maintained special, non-maintained special, mainstream private, special private etc)

c. Primary diagnosis/need type from the list below.

Autism Spectrum Disorder

Hearing Impairment

Moderate Learning

Difficulty Multi-Sensory Impairment

Other Difficulty/Disability Physical Disability

Profound and Multiple Learning Difficulty

Severe Learning Difficulty

Social Emotional and Mental Health Needs

Specific Learning Difficulty

Speech, Language and Communications Needs

Visual Impairment

SEN Support but No Specialist Assessment of Type of Need

3. Any forecasts the Local Authority have made about the future number of children and young people with SEND requirements/EHCPs who require external educational interventions in terms of primary need up to 2026.

4. The funding spent by the Local Authority each academic year on providing external educational interventions to children and young people with SEND requirements/EHCPs, going from 2017/18 to 2021/22.

5. Local Authority future spend expectations for the provision of external educational interventions to children and young people with SEND requirements/EHCPs.

6. When external educational interventions, such as tutoring, is required for children and young people with SEND requirements/EHCPs;

a. Provider/s the local authority uses for this additional support

b. The number of students referred to each provider

I can confirm that the information requested is held by Lincolnshire County Council. I have detailed below the information that is being released to you.

Children and Young People in Care

1.

2017-2018   56

2018-2019   73

2019-2020   65

2020-2021   60

2021-2022   32

2. a. Data as at 20/10/22

b. Data as at 20/10/2022

Notes:

*1: These 6 young people are all Unaccompanied Asylum Seeking Children (UASC) who are placed with a provider. As all the maintained English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) providers are currently full, the Virtual School is providing Post 16 Pupil Premium to the provider for the purpose of commissioning an ESOL trainer.

3. The following information is based on the financial year ie April to March. As the financial data is not recorded in the way it has been requested and is therefore not readily available, it would require more time than the 18 hours permitted for FOI completion to locate and collate.

Note:

*1: The amount spent in 2017-18 appears significantly less than for other years due to the fact that external educational interventions were provided to 56 children and young people across the academic year 2017-18 and the Virtual School only started commissioning tuition from the Interim Home Tuition service  in January 2018; thus the financial data represents only January to March 2018 in the 2017/18 financial year. 

4. Following the introduction of School Led Tutoring Grant, the Virtual School is now allocating funding to schools for them to source external educational interventions. 2022-2023 budget forecast for external educational interventions commissioned by the Virtual School - £55,000.

5. 

180 children and young people with EHC plans

165 children and young people SEN Support

12 children and young people undergoing EHC needs assessment

6.a-b.Currently, the following providers are used:

• Lincolnshire County Council Interim Home Tuition Team – 12 children and young people.
• Locate Accommodation in Peterborough – 6 young people

Children and Young People with SEND support/EHCP support

1. 

Notes:

*1: Interim Home Tuition data is based on the academic year as requested. The Local Authority also has children and young people accessing external educational interventions through a Personal Budget. However, we do not record the data in the way it is being requested and therefore the figures are provided for the financial year rather than the academic year.

*2: Included in the 2020-21 financial year are recorded payments to an agency providing tuition.  It is not possible to determine whether this was for one child or young person only or a number of children and young people.  It has been recorded here as if it were for one one child or young person only.

2. 

 3. Currently, the Local Authority has children and young people requiring Interim Home Tuition whilst they await a special school place. The Local Authority has recognised the growing demand on special school places and, as such, the planned capital spending commitment of £87 million will provide an additional 527 places for pupils with EHC Plans in special schools, thus significantly reducing the need for the Local Authority to provide Interim Home Tuition. By September 2022, an additional 355 places have been made available. More information can be found in the Building Communities of Specialist Provision Strategy, ratified by the council, and available here: https://www.lincolnshire.gov.uk/downloads/file/3484/building-communities-of-specialistprovision---together-in-lincolnshire). Updated information about the capital spending, which has been committed to achieving the aims within the strategy, can be found in the Council Budget Book 2022-23, available here: LCC Budget Book 2022-23 (lincolnshire.gov.uk) In addition, it is expected that 15 children and young people will continue to require educational interventions provided through a personal budget. No predictions have been made about any further take up of the option of a personal budget.

4. . The following information is based on the financial year ie April to March. As the financial data is not recorded in the way it has been requested

Notes:

*1: The remit of the Interim Home Tuition Service is to provide interim tuition in the home for children and young people who do not have a school place and therefore the entire budget has been provided for each of the requested years. 

*2: The Local Authority also funds children and young people accessing external educational interventions through a Personal Budget. However, we do not record the data in the way it is being requested and therefore some of the personal budget figures are not necessarily exclusively for the purpose of educational interventions and may include therapy or personal care packages as part of the personal budget. As this data is not readily available, it would require more time than the 18 hours permitted for FOI completion to locate and collate. 

5. The budget forecast for the full financial year 2022-23 for the Interim Home Tuition service is £1,379,229.00. Actuals spent on Personal Budgets to 20 October 2022 are £221,411.10. The forecast for the remainder of year is £74,182.80 The budget forecast for 2023-24 for Personal Budgets for the same children and young people is £200,524.53 The Local Authority has not finalised budget requirements for the Interim Home Tuition service for 2023-24 yet. However, as detailed in question 3, the Local Authority has committed to providing more special school places which will reduce the need for external educational interventions to be provided by the Interim Home Tuition Team. Updated information about the capital spending, which has been committed to achieving the aims within the strategy, can be found in the Council Budget Book 2022-23, available here: LCC Budget Book 2022-23 (lincolnshire.gov.uk)

6. a. The Local Authority’s own Interim Home Tuition Team provides the bulk of the tutoring for children and young people who are awaiting a special school place. There is sometimes a need for using agency staff and these are normally sourced via Teaching Personnel Ltd. There are currently no children and young people being taught by agency tutors. Teaching personnel Ltd has also been used in the past to deliver tuition for children and young people accessing a personal budget. However, currently all tuition for personal budgets is being sourced by parents using their Direct payments. As this data is not readily available, it would require more time than the 18 hours permitted for FOI completion to locate and collate.

b. There are currently 115 children and young people accessing tuition via the Interim Home Tuition Service. There are no children and young people currently accessing tuition via Teaching personnel Ltd. There are currently 15 children and young people accessing educational interventions sourced by parents via a personal budget. The Local Authority does not hold information about the individual providers sourced by parents. As this data is not readily available, it would require more time than the 18 hours permitted under section 12(1) of the FOI Act for FOI completion to locate and collate.