Tymes Trust Alert 2013-01 Message from Jane 18 January 2013 ====== Follow Jane on Twitter @JaneCColby or read her tweets at www.tymestrust.org ====== DEPARTMENT FOR EDUCATION ACCEPTS TYMES TRUST ADVICE New Statutory Guidance for Local Authorities ====== During much of 2012 we have been liaising closely with the team at the Department for Education writing the new statutory guidance on the education of children with health needs. Its official title is: 'Ensuring a good education for children who cannot attend school because of health needs: Statutory guidance for local authorities'. When it was finally published last week, I was delighted to see that Ministers have kept this guidance substantially the same as the final draft I had been working on. This draft was mentioned in the last Forward ME meeting and in my Alert to you of 7 November. If you are one of my Twitter followers you'll have read my tweets of 9 January, giving the link: http://www.education.gov.uk/g00219676/special-health-needs-education Nothing is perfect, but we believe that this new guidance is a big improvement on what has gone before. Many former sticking points have been addressed. For example: It is made clear that letters to school from your GP are perfectly acceptable, not just information from a consultant, and it is also stated that delays in providing suitable education due to waiting for a consultant's opinion or asking for repeated opinions from a consultant are not acceptable and should not occur (paras 11/12). It is spelled out that the 15 days' absence by which time arrangements should have been made can be consecutive or cumulative. Virtual education can be provided on its own when necessary (para 7) without attendance at a school or a unit being part of the package. Whilst the government would like children to have face to face education when they are well enough, this does not preclude a virtual education course when appropriate. A reintegration plan for a return to school is not required until the child actually appears to be approaching the stage when a return might be appropriate. This should remove pressure to plan for a return before it is likely to be sustainable. The Department also makes clear that sick children cannot just be arbitrarily removed by the school from their roll. Moreover, the Local Authority's responsibility to ensure that sick children get the education they need applies over all types of school including Academies and Free schools and also Independent schools. The Local Authority, however, does not have to get directly involved if suitable education is already being provided, so we believe it may often fall to parents to alert the Local Authority if they feel that a school is not providing suitable education for their child. There is plenty of quotable material in this guidance with which to make your case, however. I have been giving advice to government officials and Ministers about the education of children with ME for many years and at last it has borne fruit. It's amazing that the first ever 'Guidelines for Schools', describing how schools can help children with ME (which I wrote with Dr Betty Dowsett) were launched way back in 1991. I then wrote the first specialist article on ME and education, which appeared in the British Journal of Special Education in 1994, entitled 'The School Child with ME'. In 2001, Special Children journal published my '10 Points on the Education of Children with ME', and gave Tymes Trust permission to reprint it at http://www.tymestrust.org/pdfs/tenpoints.pdf. And there have of course been many other articles and committee work over the years. So whatever you are struggling with, please do not give up. Hard work and persistence can be rewarded. The same principle applies in learning to manage this distressing illness in the way that is right for your own child, rather than struggling with how some official wants to tell you to live your life! FOLLOWING MY TWEETS Twitter is the quickest way to find out my news (and the occasional bit of personal chat) and if you don't want to sign up to Twitter, you can keep up with my tweets via www.tymestrust.org. All good wishes, Jane Jane Colby FRSA Executive Director The Young ME Sufferers Trust PO Box 4347, Stock, Essex, CM4 9TE www.tymestrust.org Tel: 0845 003 9002 Holder of The Queen's Award for Voluntary Service: The MBE for Volunteer Groups ====== READ ALL PREVIOUS ALERTS AND SUBSCRIBE TO MY LIST AT www.tymestrust.org To unsubscribe, send an email via the website Contact Us form. ====== You are welcome to redistribute or reprint this email without seeking our permission provided: 1) you do not abbreviate, add to, or change the text in any way; 2) the authorship information is retained; and 3) www.tymestrust.org is credited as the source. Jane Colby is Executive Director of The Young ME Sufferers Trust. She was a Headteacher for nine years, a member of the government Chief Medical Officer's Working Group on CFS/ME and co-authored ME/CFS In UK Schools, the largest epidemiological study of ME to date. She is a life member of the National Association of Head Teachers and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts. Copyright (c) 2013 The Young ME Sufferers Trust