Essex Family Forum Newsletter - Issue 6

Welcome to our 'new look' termly newsletter,

bringing you SEND news from across Essex

Essex Family Forum - About Us

In March we held some informal drop in session’s, with our volunteer family champions and our wider network of SEND parents and carers. The intention of these sessions was to provide an opportunity for SEND parents and carers to have a frank and honest open discussion regarding the challenges parents and carers face in the SEND system.

You may be aware that the recent People & Families Scrutiny Meeting raised a lot of queries both in the meeting and on social media and we felt that it was important to try to provide an opportunity to explore some of these. We will continue to look at how we can best engage with parents and carers continuously and welcome any feedback on how the best way to do this is. You can email us at hello@essexfamilyforum.org

We also wanted to take the opportunity to address some of the questions the 'People & Families Scrutiny Meeting' raised about EFF.

Does Essex Family Forum work for Essex County Council?
No, Essex Family Forum (EFF) is an independent community interest company, made up of a group of parents and carers of children and young people (0-25yrs) with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND). We work with (not for) the local authority’s Education and Social Care teams and with health commissioning bodies to represent parent views and experiences to influence and inform the provision and services used by our children, young people and their families.

How does Essex Family Forum represent YOUR voice?
EFF gathers your voices in many ways, through surveys, attending events/coffee mornings, via our Family Champion Volunteers and via our anonymous Graffiti Wall where families can tell us their experiences across all areas of SEND.

All of this feedback is presented in a termly report to services with a commitment from them to work with us to address that feedback. We use YOUR voice in all our meetings with services, to try and make improvements for our children and young people.

Where are Essex Family Forum based?
EFF is made up of parents /carers across Essex who work/volunteer part time from home. Our legally required registered address is County Hall, as we do not have an office base and wish to keep private home addresses out of the public domain, however we are independent of Essex County Council.

Updated “Supporting Your Neurodivergent Child” Resource Pack

We are pleased to announce that the next print run is underway. The resource packs will be distributed very shortly to everyone on the waiting list and we would just like to take the opportunity to thank you for your patience whilst waiting for your copy. If you would like to receive a copy please visit our website https://essexfamilyforum.org/resources/nd-pack.

Note: Based on feedback we received we have changed the name of the resource pack to "Supporting Your Neurodivergent Child" and we have amended this throughout the pack where relevant.

EFF Family Impact Survey 2024 is closed – What was it for and what happens next?

First of all we would like to say a huge thank you to all who took the time to complete the survey, we received over 1200 responses from across Essex and really appreciate everyone who took the time to complete the survey.

Why do we conduct this survey?
We conduct this survey to measure the current levels of parental satisfaction with local services for SEND Families and to compare with the data collected within our previous surveys. We acknowledge that there seems to be unprecedented pressure within the “system” with regard to capacity and resources available to meet the needs of children and young people and we know that families that are being greatly impacted by these issues.

We know that there is work being undertaken to improve services for children and young people with SEND and there are pockets of good practice which need to be highlighted and held up as the standard to reach. However, we are also aware that families’ experiences are still inconsistent and can be very challenging.

What happens next?
We anticipate the report will be finalised at the beginning of May. We will make recommendations through our conclusions to the Family Feedback Coordination and Oversight Group (COG) and will work collaboratively with them to ensure that the findings feed into the SEND improvement work across Essex.

As the Parent Carer Forum for Essex, we want to assure our families that we will continue to provide robust challenge to ensure that SEND services remain focused on improving the lived experiences of families.

I have information/feedback that I want to share NOW – how do I do that?
If you missed the survey you can share any current feedback on our Graffiti Wall. It is available all year round and is reviewed each quarter. Please click here to provide your feedback.

Partnerships for Inclusion of Neurodiversity in Schools (PINS)

We recently shared with our volunteer family champions that Essex County Council, Mid and South Essex, Suffolk and North East Essex and Herts and West Essex ICBs have, together with EFF, agreed to deliver PINS across selected primary schools in Essex (excluding Southend and Thurrock).

PINS is a programme funded by the Shared Outcomes Fund, and delivered between the Department for Education (DfE), NHS England (NHSE) and the Department for Health and Social Care (DHSC), with the aim of bringing health specialists, education specialists, and expert parent carers into mainstream primary settings to:

Help shape whole school SEND provision.
Provide early interventions at a school level
Upskill school staff
Support and strengthen partnerships between schools and parent.

The aim is that the programme will leave a sustainable impact, building a legacy of closer collaboration between schools, parent carers, education, and health, as well as developing the capacity of schools to facilitate the best possible outcomes for children and young people who are neurodiverse. EFF will be creating dedicated parent participation groups in the schools involved to support parent relationships, so it will be a fantastic opportunity for our Family Champions to get involved.

We are at very early stages, and the delivery is subject to the procurement of a provider.

EFF Regional & National Reach

As you will be aware Essex Family Forum is part of the National Network of Parent Carer Forums (NNPCF) and the Eastern Region Regional Parent Carer Forum (ERPCF).

The NNPCF recently published their annual report, which EFF is proud to feature in, click on the following link to read the report https://nnpcf.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/NNPCF-Annual-Report-2023.pdf

Some of the EFF team recently attended the Eastern Region Parent Carer Forum Termly meeting and had a surprise visit from Her Majesty the Queen and Strictly Come Dancing star Johannes Radebe. It was also a chance to catch up with the other local Parent Carer Forums who together make up the Essex Alliance representing parents and carers across Southend Essex and Thurrock.

You may have seen 'Contact for families with disabled children' recently featured two articles about EFF, one about our Graffiti Wall and another about the "Supporting Your Neurodivergent Child" resource pack. Contact also presented these as part of the PCF achievements at the NNPCF conference.

Digital Portal – Mid & South Essex
The Mid South Essex Community collaborative (EPUT, NELFT and Provide) are moving to a digital portal for Children and Young People who are being referred to community paediatrics for concerns regarding Neurodivergent conditions. The aim is to improve patient experience and communication. It will include functions for schools, GPs etc., to make the initial referral, with the ability to upload reports and complete questionnaires both for professionals and families. EFF have been working closely with the collaborative in the development of the portal. A number of our Family Champion Volunteers and parents/carers from across Southend, Essex and Thurrock have been giving their views on the portal design and communications. The portal is being constructed at present and hopes to be launched in the next couple of months, we are very hopeful that this will make the process, which we know can be complicated and stressful for families, much clearer.

Send The Right Message (STRM) have moved to a new location!
Kiri and Katrina from EFF were pleased to visit one of our Family Champions, Maggie Cleary, CEO of STRM in their new premises. These are located on the Ground Floor, 320D High Road, in Benfleet. SEND the Right Message Charity is a ‘by parents and for parents’ charity supporting families with children and young people with specific educational needs or disabilities (SEND) in Southend, Castle Point & Rochford Districts. It was great to find out all about their new service offer from April and all the work they are doing.

To find out more about STRM visit their website at https://strmsupport.co.uk/

SEND ROADSHOWS – SPRING 2024
We really enjoyed having our usual stand at the SEND Roadshows this term! They were all really busy and it was lovely to meet some new faces and also some familiar faces. We asked families for feedback on 3 specific areas: “Waiting well” (focusing on support & information whilst waiting for assessments and/or diagnosis), School Attendance difficulties and Signposting & Onward Referrals for appropriate support. We got lots of useful feedback and this will be used in conversations with education, health and social care services to help them focus on areas of improvement.

The dates for the summer term roadshows have now been released, for further details of these click here to visit the relevant page on the local offer website.

Training Opportunities for Family Champions
The Eastern Region of Parent Carer Forums (ERPCF) used some additional funding to arrange IPSEA training for the parent carer forums across the East of England.

EFF’s Chair, Kevin, attended along with 4 of our dedicated Family Champions. Jo, the NNPCF Director for East England and who also works for EFF said “providing sessions such as this, is vital for parents and carers. This training allows them to understand the complex system we have to navigate to secure appropriate education and provision for our children and young people. Empowering family champions across Essex with information not only enables them to better understand the system themselves, but also helps to ensure they can provide correct information to the families in their community.”

Click here to share your feedback via our 'Graffiti Wall'

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County Hall,
Market Road
Chelmsford
Essex
CM1 1QH
United Kingdom