Early Help is usually the first tier of support offered when a child or family is struggling. It isn’t a safeguarding measure; it’s a voluntary, preventative service designed to identify needs early and bring professionals together.
When a parent is seeking EOTAS, the tribunal is not interested in opinions, preferences or “EOTAS would be nice”. It is interested in evidence of need, evidence of why school cannot meet those needs, and evidence of what provision is required instead. The Working Document is where this becomes visible. Every line must link via need...
Right now, EOTAS is a direct Local Authority responsibility written into Section F of the EHCP. Under the new model, a school becomes the accountable body even if the child cannot attend that school. The DfE suggests this would “generally be a specialist setting,” not the school where the child previously experienced trauma or placement breakdown.
Schools are being told they’ll be “backed” to enforce strict bans, Ofsted will check compliance, and from June onwards many families are receiving letters announcing zero‑tolerance policies. For most families, this is an inconvenience. For SEND families, it’s a panic. Because for many autistic, ADHD, PDA, or sensory‑sensitive children, a phone isn’t a social device it’s...
We are seeing a sharp rise in bullying, school‑based trauma, and mental health crises in neurodivergent children as communicated in our group by SEND Parents - and a rise in CAMHS refusing referrals because children “don’t meet criteria”. Here is what the data shows, what this means for ND children, and what you can do if...
There’s a lot of worry right now about Right to Choose (RTC) ADHD/Autism assessments being “paused” in some areas, including parts of West Yorkshire. Before anyone panics, it’s important we understand why this is happening and what your rights actually are.
We talk a lot about children’s behaviour not as something to “fix”, but as communication. What we don’t talk about nearly enough is the adult side of the equation.
Emotionally Based School Avoidance (EBSA) describes when a child or young person struggles to attend school because of anxiety, sensory overwhelm, trauma, unmet neurodivergent needs, or a combination of these factors. Early identification, a strengths‑based graduated response (Assess, Plan, Do, Review — APDR) initiated by schools together with a carefully staged reintegration plan are central to...
You should never be asked to design, price, or fully deliver Education Other Than At School (EOTAS) as a substitute for the local authority’s legal duties. That being said it would seem more and more LA's are doing this to potentially deliver the bare minimum! This post explains the law parents can rely on, the clear...
Parents who ask for clarity, challenge unlawful decisions, or escalate concerns through proper channels are not being vexatious. They are advocating. And when schools or local authorities use this label to silence or side line families, it’s not just unfair it’s unlawful.
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