Home Local News New report shows how services are being built around families

New report shows how services are being built around families

0

An inspection into services for children with special educational needs and disabilities has found young people and their families ‘are at the heart’ of Wigan Council’s strategy.

The joint inspection from Ofsted and CQC looked at how the council and its partners deliver health, education and social care services for children with SEND (special educational needs and disabilities) and their transition between children’s and adults services.

The overall positive report follows Ofsted judging the council’s services to support children who need help and protection as good 18 months ago; Wigan being one of a small number of areas nationwide to receive a good judgement for safeguarding children and a positive SEND inspection.

The inspectors praised the ambitious plan in place to transform services for children with SEND and reflected that this plan has been and will continue to be co-designed with families and young people.

During the week inspection in June 2018 inspectors spoke to more than 200 families about their experiences.

They also spoke to a wide range of staff and governors about services to see how they were implementing SEND reforms.

Multi-agency partnership working in the borough was highlighted as a strength and giving staff permission to make decisions was shown to be ‘improving lives’.

The Parent Carer Forum was also highlighted as being a strong mechanism for sharing, support and engagement which demonstrated the council’s approach to co-producing services with families and based around their needs.

The report also picked up on areas which can be strengthened including children and young people’s academic outcomes, which are not improving quickly enough, and the attendance of SEND pupils, particularly at high school and the support required to allow pupils and parents to feel confident in our mainstream school settings.

Councillor Jenny Bullen, cabinet member for children and young people’s services, said:

“We are very proud of our staff from across the partnership who work tirelessly to support our children and families as acknowledged through this inspection.

“We know that there is so much more we can do together through The Deal to improve our approach to SEND. Following this thorough inspection and the very positive outcome, we can deliver our future services with confidence, while continuing to place our children and families at the heart of the plans that they have helped to develop.

“The report importantly outlines that we are aware of our strengths and areas for improvement, that we know what good looks like and that we have an ambitious plan to transform our services.

“We know it is absolutely crucial to involve children and families every step of the way and we genuinely want to continue working with them to design our services around their needs. We are determined to keep listening and working closely with them to make our approach to SEND the best it can be.”

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here