Earlier this year, the DfE published a clear-sighted green paper on the Special Educational Needs (SEND) system in England. Its appraisal of the many challenges faced by our most vulnerable children is commendably honest. Despite record and ever-increasing funding, it concludes, the SEND system is failing. It costs an eye-watering amount of money, isn’t improving outcomes, and navigating it is often a deeply unsatisfactory and even upsetting experience for young people and their families.
We read it closely, because this is more than professionally important for us. We both have children who inhabit this world. Tom’s son Freddie has Downs syndrome and autism, while Ben’s daughter Bessie has Williams syndrome. Both have learning disabilities which will always make academic work harder for them.
