The government has announced funding to mainstream schools in England to make them more inclusive for pupils with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND). This includes £1.6 billion over three years directly going to schools, early years settings, and colleges, and £1.8 billion over the same period to offer more access to experts including specialist teachers and speech and language therapists, the BBC reports.
The funding for mainstream schools is part of a “major SEND system overhaul,” the broadcaster writes, with government plans for further school reforms to be published in full shortly. Teaching unions said they would closely scrutinise the proposals. The money, according to one was “barely a drop in the bucket” of what they needed following “years of underfunding.”
The latest announcement comes after details of the government’s proposals leaked before the Schools White Paper was due to be published. The paper is the formal document that lays out the government’s SEND plans. It includes plans to reassess children’s education, health and care plans (ECHP), referring to a legal document that lists what support children are entitled to after they leave primary school and after GCSEs.
The change could make fewer children retaining their ECHPs into secondary school, an “expensive part of the SEND system,” according to the BBC. Those who would be in Year 6 in 2029 would be the first to be reviewed under these proposals, ahead of them beginning secondary school in 2030.
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