Lack of specialist staff hinders support for Send children, teacher survey finds | Special educational needs

Large class sizes and inadequate staffing levels hinder teachers’ capacity to support children with special educational needs and disabilities (Send), according to a large survey of state school teachers in England.

Nine in 10 (89%) of 10,000 teachers surveyed by the National Education Union (NEU) ahead of the annual conference starting in Brighton on Monday said class sizes were too large to be “fully inclusive”.

Four in five (83%) said inadequate support staff in the classroom was a barrier to participation, while seven in 10 (69%) said lack of access to specialist services was also a problem.

A teacher described the situation of a student stuck on the waiting list. “There is a suicidal child in my class who is on a six-month waiting list just to be ‘seen’ by a specialist,” they said. “How can this be?”

Just one in five respondents (22%) said they were confident that referring a student for an assessment, diagnosis or support would get them the help they needed, while nine in 10 (88%) said an “inappropriate” curriculum was a barrier to some degree.

The findings come shortly after the government published a white paper setting out plans to improve attendance in mainstream schools to ensure children from Send are better supported as part of a radical overhaul of the special educational needs system.

NEU general secretary Daniel Kebede warned that mainstream schools did not have the resources or staff to meet current levels of need and said the additional money promised by the government to fund the changes was insufficient.

“While NEU supports many of the principles in the white paper, this survey of teachers shows that mainstream schools do not have the resources and staff to meet current student needs,” he said.

Kebede added that schools would need “significantly more resources” to meet the government’s targets. Under current funding plans, the participation grant would amount to £13,000 (equivalent to one part-time teaching assistant) for the average primary school.

Under proposals put forward by education secretary Bridget Phillipson last month, mainstream schools in England would create additional workload by assessing pupils with special needs and drawing up individual support plans before the changes come into full force in 2029-30.

The aim is to provide support for the majority of the 1.3 million children in state schools identified as having special needs who currently do not have the education, health and care plans (EHCPs) required for individualized support. In the future, only children with the most complex needs will be eligible for EHCPs.

The Department for Education (DfE) will provide £1.6bn over three years to schools and colleges to boost attendance. An additional £1.8 billion will fund local authorities to recruit experts to call into schools, and an additional £200 million will pay for additional teacher training.

A DfE spokesperson said: “This government is hugely ambitious for every single child and that’s why we are delivering once-in-a-generation reforms to put inclusion at the heart of education.

“We are supporting schools and teachers with more resources and expertise, with our £4bn investment to improve the training of teachers and support staff about Send, ensuring every education setting has easy access to Send experts and providing direct funding for schools to make changes to improve participation.”