Education

Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Children and Families Edward Timpson has spoken about special educational needs policy reform in the Pears Annual Lecture, organised by Ambitious about Autism. The speech transcript is available at https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/edward-timpson-speaks-about-speci...

https://www.gov.uk/government/policies/increasing-options-and-improving-...

The Excellence Gateway has published 14 case studies based on work undertaken through the LSIS cluster groups. These include 2 case studies, centred on employment, from Blueberry Academy and City College Norwich's supported employment service, MINT.

The Department for Education has published a progress report on the Special Educational Needs and Disability (SEND) pathfinders. The SEND Green Paper pathfinder programme was launched in September 2011 following a competitive application process to which all local authorities and their health partners could apply.

Over the past eighteen months, 20 pathfinders involving 31 local authorities and their health partners, have been working within existing statutory frameworks towards the following common objectives:

Sarah Teather, Minister for Children and Families has issued a written ministerial statement to announce publication of draft provisions to improve the support provided to children and young people with special educational needs, and to their parents. The text is as follows:

Ofsted has published its Skills for Employment report. The report found that when matching unemployed adults to specific courses, progression to employment was not a high enough priority. Too many programmes focused on achievement of qualifications and courses did not extend to training that lead to job specific skills.

A programme is being launched to help ease the frustrations of securing support for those with special educational needs. The Learning and Skills Improvement Service (LSIS) is going to be inviting organisations to tender for work to help children and young people with learning difficulties and/or disabilities, and their families.

The Government has announced that 14 English colleges are to trial supported internships in the coming acaedmic year as part of the Next Steps reforms.

The Government has responded to the consultation on the Special Educational Needs (SEN) and Disability Green Paper. Support and aspiration: A new approach to special educational needs and disability – progress and next steps sets out a summary of the key responses to the consultation questions in the green paper, current progress and further plans.

NIACE is seeking the nomination of disabled learners for the Adult Learners Week Awards. Each year NIACE co-ordinates Adult Learners’ Week, the UK’s largest annual festival of learning; inspiring thousands of people each year to discover how learning can change their lives. A core part of the week are the Adult Learners’ Week Awards that recognise and celebrate the learning achievements of adults who have transformed their lives for the better, and who can inspire others to give learning a go.