School not inclusive
There are an increasing number of children who are not thriving within the mainstream school system. The only option for parents and carers of children struggling is to try and get individual support plans – EHCPs. This focus on individual children as the problem to be solved distracts from the many problems within the school system.
Since 2012 there has been a 91% rise in the number of children with a statement of ‘special educational needs or disability’ (SEND) and an education health care plan (EHCP). Since 2015 there has been a 250% rise in appeals to the First Tier Tribunal. Parents consistently ‘win’ these appeals, in 2020 95% of First Tier Tribunal appeals were awarded in favour of parents, meaning that their children should have been receiving support denied to them.
Home education can work well for neurodivergent children but often families are forced into this from lack of options, rather than choosing this approach.
“…another worrying development in England is the expansion of labels that situate problems of educational progress within children, not least through the adoption of the term ‘special educational needs and disability’.”
Emeritus Professor Mel Ainslow CBE
Special Needs Jungle: “Every learner matters and matters equally”. But in England’s education system, do they really? (2024)
“SEND is something which happens in the interaction between a child and the education system. In a system where no 6-year-old is expected to sit still and learn to write their name, then a 6-year-old who just wants to run around outside isn’t a problem. In a system where everyone is meant to be able to read by age 6, then they are.”
Dr Naomi Fisher
Think Again Blog Posts (2024)
Children’s experiences
Spectrum Gaming
Watch this if you think autism is bad (with autistic children’s perspectives)
“…children who do not fit the normative ‘ideal child’, are disproportionately likely to be permanently excluded from school: three to six times more likely for neurodivergent young people.”
Dr Anna Cook
British Psychological Society: The myth of the ‘normal’ child (2024)
“Time and time again we hear that the education system is not working for PDA learners and that home education and alternative provisions are a lifeline for the 7 in 10 PDA children and young people who struggle to access a school environment.”
PDA Society
No to Schools Bill
Bullying
2016 DfE research looking at pupils in year 10 found that half of children classed as SEND experienced bullying with one third experiencing this at least once a week. One fifth of children classed as SEND experienced violence (threatened or actual) over the year with actual violence most likely to happen at school.
“Teachers, health and social care professionals, and neurotypical peers were frequently singled out as unsafe people and school as an unsafe place, whilst parents, home, and autistic peers were often referred to as safe.”
Dr Sinead Mullally, Alice Wood, Cherice Chantelle Edwards, Sophie Connolly, Hannah Constable, Stuart Watson, Jacqui Rodgers, Kieran Rose and Nic King
Autistic voice: Sharing autistic children’s experiences and insights (2024)
“While not a story of exclusivity relating solely to autism, School Distress is a story dominated by complex neurodivergence and a seemingly systemic failure to meet the needs of these CYP. Given the disproportionate number of disabled CYP impacted, we ask whether the United Kingdom is upholding its responsibility to ensure the “right to an education” for all CYP (Human Rights Act 1998).”
Sophie E. Connolly, Hannah L. Constable and Dr Sinéad L. Mullally
Frontiers in Psychiatry: School distress and the school attendance crisis: a story dominated by neurodivergence and unmet need (2023)
“Negative experiences involving teachers were linked with a lack of understanding, leading to a loss of security: “Adults at school when I was there would not listen and I felt very unsafe all the time. This was all adults apart from one.” The children explained that their teachers “don’t understand my need for choices”. In extension, a child stated that “the teachers tell me off for fiddling with stuff”.”
Dr Sinead Mullally, Alice Wood, Cherice Chantelle Edwards, Sophie Connolly, Hannah Constable, Stuart Watson, Jacqui Rodgers, Kieran Rose and Nic King
Autistic voice: Sharing autistic children’s experiences and insights (2024)
Fix the system
The approach we are using is one which involves coercion, force and punishment. One which involves large numbers of distressed children as well as growing numbers rejecting the mainstream school system. This is a choice, it isn’t the experience of every country. We need to focus on changing our approach rather than the child.
“When we locate the problem in individuals, we neutralise any pressure for systemic change. We assume that the problem isn’t the system, it’s the children.”
Dr Naomi Fisher
British Psychological Society: What does neurodiversity really imply for education? (2024)
“…increasing emphases on standards, excellence and competencies for teachers have led to heavily regulated frameworks for teacher training and development, which are not always conducive to social justice within education.”
Dr Anna Cook
Journal of Research in Special Educational Needs: Conceptualisations of neurodiversity and barriers to inclusive pedagogy in schools: A perspective article (2024)
“The pressures that schools are under from the rigid curricula imposed by the Education Act (2011) in conjunction with the legacy of austerity and financial strangleholds, means that the flexibility required for inclusive education just isn’t available in schools in the same way that it was a decade or so ago.”
Dr Joanna Stanbridge (EP Revolutionary Collective)
Ed Psych: We Don’t Need Just SEND Reform, We Need a SEND Revolution. Who’s In?
“We need to substitute the word “education” for school, which manifestly does not suit all children. We need to rethink a monolithic education system which diagnoses anxiety as oppositional or deviant behaviour.”
Tim Linehan
LSE Blog: Let’s stop talking truancy
“This requires new thinking that focuses attention on the barriers experienced by some children that lead them to become marginalised as a result of contextual factors, such as inappropriate curricula and forms of assessment, and inadequate teacher preparation and support.”
Emeritus Professor Mel Ainslow CBE
Special Needs Jungle: “Every learner matters and matters equally”. But in England’s education system, do they really? (2024)
“Address the crisis in young people’s emotional wellbeing and mental health in schools. End high stakes testing in schools, funding Special Educational Needs (SEND) properly, create a properly funded, genuinely comprehensive schooling system. Abolish OFSTED or radically reform it to encourage schools to promote real learning instead of fear, as asked for by young people in their letter to OFSTED. Children’s mental health is not just about having therapists in schools. Children’s mental health, like adults, will also improve when they and their families live in a healthier society.”
Psychologists for Change
Manifesto (2019)