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'Give us a voice' - angry parents
PARENTS staged an angry demonstration to protest against a shake up of Sheffield's special needs education service which they claim is being implemented without consultations.
The protest was held outside the Salvation Army building on Psalter Lane, Nether Edge, where a briefing between service chiefs and headteachers was due to take place.
Many of the campaign group No Voice were mums and dads of youngsters with autism and Asperger's Syndrome, who said neither parents, pupils or teachers had been asked for their views on the planned changes.
But education chiefs insist that claims that special needs services are facing drastic alterations are 'very premature' and pledge that full consultations will be held on future proposals.
Claire le Feuvre, of the Sheffield Autistic Society, said a key concern was that in future special schools and units in mainstream schools would be seen only as short-term options for youngsters.
"It seems that the vast majority of children will be expected to spend no more than one to two years in these settings before they are placed in their mainstream school," she said.
"We also believe that the authority is seeking to reduce the number of pupils who are statemented, telling parents it is nothing that they need to worry about."
But the moves weakened support for children with special needs, as would plans to devolve special needs budgets directly to mainstream schools where the legal implications of statements would not be recognised, Claire said.
"We also believe specialist services for children with autism, which are already extremely limited, will be absorbed into a generic service serving pupils with any kind of disability. These are huge changes and they are all being implemented too quickly.
"There is a need to understand that effective services are planned around the child, not dictated from some remote office. And it is difficult to understand how the local authority intends to make progress with such a complex matter without involving the real experts - the children themselves, their families and the teachers," Claire added.
Jayne Ludlam, director of specialist services at the council's Children's Service, said:"We are currently looking at the way our integrated resource units in schools support children with special educational needs, so we can make sure that the best possible support continues to be offered to children and their families.
"We will not, of course, make any changes to this service without a proper consultation."
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Weather for Sheffield
Saturday 26 May 2012
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