Annual reviews

Introduction

The Annual Review is the statutory process of looking at the needs, provision and outcomes specified in an Education Health and Care Plan (EHCP) and deciding whether these need to change. The first review of the EHCP must be held and concluded within 12 months of the EHCP being finalised. Following Reviews must be held and concluded within 12 months of the previous review.

To conclude an Annual Review all the following steps, not just the meeting, must be followed:

• Information must be gathered from you and from professionals about your child and then circulated two weeks before the meeting.
• An annual review meeting must take place to discuss your child and the EHCP (this is the meeting itself).
• After the meeting the school must sent a report of their recommendations and circulated to everyone who attended and the local authority (if they did not attend).
• Then the local authority must consider this report and the recommendations, along with the EHCP, in two weeks.
• The local authority must then notify you of their decision within four weeks of the meeting. This would be to either, cease the EHCP, to amend the EHCP or to keep it as it is.

An annual review must still happen if you have a live appeal.

The IPSEA provide information on the various stages of annual reviews (PDF).