About SEND Advice Surrey

Introduction

Local authorities must have regard to the importance of providing children and their parents and young people with information and support necessary to participate in decisions. (Page 30)

Our vision for children with special educational needs and disabilities is the same for all children and young people – that they achieve well in their early years, at school and in college and lead happy and fulfilled lives. (Page 11)

SEND Code of Practice

Who are we?

SEND Advice Surrey is Surrey's Special Educational Needs and/or Disabilities information, advice and support (SENDIAS) service.

We provide information, advice and support to parents, carers and young people with special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND) aged 0 to 25 years.

The information, advice and support we provide is impartial, confidential, free and at arm's length to the Local Authority. Our experienced team will listen to your concerns and discuss any issues in confidence.

Our service is statutory, and we aim to provide information, advice and support to empower parents, carers and young people to:

  • fully participate in discussions and make informed decisions
  • express their views and wishes about education and future aspirations
  • promote independence and self-advocacy
  • develop positive relationships with nurseries, preschools, schools, colleges, universities, the local authority and supported services to achieve positive outcomes.

How can we help?

We can offer information on:

  • your rights and responsibilities
  • who to talk to in school about your concerns
  • how your child is assessed and helped in school
  • what happens during an education, health and care (EHC) needs assessment
  • what happens during a statutory assessment
  • what you can do if you are not happy with a decision made about your child's SEND
  • mediation
  • Surrey policies and processes
  • national policies and legislation
  • advocacy services and other services.

Enquiries are varied and can range from concerns about a child's progress in nurseries or school, through to children and young people who have complex needs and difficulties.

SEND Advice Surrey ensures that the views of parents, carers and young people are heard and understood and that these views inform local policy and practice. If you have any feedback on our website or any of the information on this site, please let us know by emailing sendadvice@surreycc.gov.uk

We provide support by:

  • listening to your concerns
  • exploring options
  • talking through and preparing paperwork and completing forms
  • joining you at meetings or helping you prepare for them
  • ensuring your views are heard
  • looking at ways of overcoming differences where there is disagreement.
  • informing you about other local and national organisations that can help you.

What to expect from us

We operate all year round, including in school holidays where we have a reduced team.

Our service is:

  • free of charge,
  • confidential,
  • impartial, neutral and we don't take sides,
  • at arm's length from Surrey County Council and health and social care services.

Our small team of Advisors are trained in SEND law but are not legally qualified. You may get help from any of the team. We keep records so that whoever you are dealing with will know what you have already told us, so you won't have to keep repeating it.

We use a triage system to decide in what order we will respond to queries and how much help we will give and what type of help is needed. It may be that someone with a tight deadline needs to be called urgently. Generally, we call on a first come, first served basis.

You can contact us by phone and leaving us a message, by emailing or contacting us through our website's contact page. We may even meet you at events or training. All email enquiries will receive an automatic response. Please note that when we call will be show as No Caller ID or withheld.

You should expect a response within 3 working days of contacting us. This can be longer in busier times, but we will state this in an email reply, on our voicemail message or on our website.

Advice maybe given through email replies, over the phone or on a Teams call. We also offer Teams calls every Friday in term time where Advisors will be able to advise. These are called Face to Face Friday.

Our information may include weblinks and written information, short films or webinars. Please make use of the information. If you will find this difficult, you could ask a friend to help you. Please also come back to clarify any points you did not understand or if you want to ask an additional question.

There may be occasions when new members of the team may join the call to listen in for training purposes, but we will always check this is OK with you first.

All calls, Teams conversations, emails and documents about your child or young person will be added to our confidential database. Each family will have their own case and only the SEND Advice Team will have access to this.

How does SENDIAS look after information about me and/or my child?

The Data Protection Act 2018 and General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) regulate the way we use your personal information. You have the right for your personal information to be treated securely, confidentially and with sensitivity and respect.

We would only share information without your consent in very exceptional circumstances when there is reason to believe there is a risk of harm to a child, a young person or a third party.

Support with Tribunals Appeals

Part of our role is also to advise and support with Tribunal appeals. We can support you through the whole process, for example by helping to complete the appeal forms, advise on the different types of appeal, and help explain each step.

In a few cases we can act as your representative however this is only in limited cases where you are unable to do this on your own for example if English is an additional language or if you are unable to read or write. In these cases, we would be the main point of contact for SENDIST and the LA. We will also let the LA know that we need to be copied into emails they send so we are aware of what is happening and any changes, for example. We also ask that any information you have is sent to us or any emails received are forwarded to us, so we are aware of updates. This is to ensure that we can support you fully. In cases where we are not kept updated we will not continue to represent you.

Note: Hearing deadlines are important and you may need to make a firm decision after research. You can of course find alternative support at any point.

Support with meetings

Our advice may include helping you to prepare for a meeting. In exceptional circumstances we may be able to attend a meeting with you however this will usually be remotely. You can always take a friend to your meeting to make notes for you and ensure you remember to ask or say what you wanted.

How we work with other services

We won't let other people or services know that you have contacted us unless you want us to. The only exception is if there is a child protection enquiry about you or your child. With your written permission, we may sometimes contact other people or services on your behalf. This maybe if there is a reason that you are unable to do this yourself. This includes relevant professionals in education, health and social care, for example, a Case Officer, a social worker, health visitor, family support worker or your school's SENCo.

I have advice from a solicitor, will SEND Advice Surrey still help me?

If you are already receiving personalised advice from paid consultants or lawyers, our help will be limited to signposting to avoid duplication and confusion.

How are we doing?

We send out a monthly questionnaire to all those families that have contacted us. It may be that you get the survey a few times if we are supporting you on a long-term basis. Everyone is signed up to this so if you wish to not receive it then please let us know.

The questionnaire covers, for example, how we are doing, how we helped you and how you contacted us. All this is useful to be able to improve our service. If you are not happy to participate, please let us know.

I'm unhappy, what can I do?

If you are dissatisfied with our service and want to discuss your concern, please contact the team's manager.

If you wish to make a formal complaint, please follow this link: Children's social care, education and SEND complaints - Surrey County Council

Other sources of information, advice and support

  • IPSEA - offers free and independent legally based information, advice and support to help get the right education for children and young people with all kinds of special educational needs and disabilities (SEND).
  • Contact - helps families feel valued, supported, confident and informed.
  • Child Law Advice- provide specialist advice and information on child, family and education law to parents, carers and young people in England.
  • Surrey's Local Offer or Surrey Additional Needs and Disabilities partnership.

Meet the team

We are a small team based at Woodhatch Centre in Reigate. We sit away from any other team that supports children.

We have a Helpline Officer called Jill who will be your first point of contact. Jill takes the voicemail messages off and adds the 100 plus emails we get each day. Jill will also add the website contacts to our database.

We then have our Advisors:

Andrew is full time and Judy and Kerry are full time but in term time only. Beckie works 30 hours a week, term time only. Kerry also works three days a week in the holidays.

Lynn is the team manager.

Please note that Judy, Kerry and Lynn will be leaving on 1st December.

Find your local SEND Information and Advice Service (SENDIAS)

If you do not live in Surrey and are looking for the SEND information, advice and support (SENDIAS) service for your area then please contact the service for where you pay your council tax. A full list of the services in England can be found on the Council for Disabled Children website.

National Helpline - Contact

Parents can visit the Contact helpline website for information or call the free helpline on 0808 808 3555 between 9.30am and 5.00pm, Monday to Friday or by email at helpline@contact.org.uk