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Freedom of Information (FOI) questions on local authority education provision for children and young people with vision impairment in England: 2015

Executive summary

Sue Keil

Evidence and Service Impact

February 2016

Background

In June 2015 RNIB sent a Freedom of Information (FOI) request to all 152 local authorities (LAs) in England asking a range of questions about current and future education provision for children and young people with vision impairment.

This was the third RNIB FOI survey of LA educational provision for children and young people with vision impairment. The key service in co-ordinating and providing specialist support is the vision impairment (VI) education advisory service. Many VI services have been adversely affected by public sector cuts and a key aim of the first FOI request, sent in May 2013, was to benchmark existing provision in each LA against future policy decisions. The aim of the second and third surveys has been to monitor changes that may have taken place over each successive year, and to find out whether any further changes were planned in the near future. More specifically, we wanted to know what changes (if any) local authorities had made in response to the Children and Families Act 2014 and the new Special Educational Needs and Disability (SEND) Code of Practice.

The findings from this FOI request will be used to support RNIB local and national campaigning to protect specialist education services and provision for children and young people with vision impairment.

Method

FOI questionnaires were sent as a Word attachment to an email, to the FOI officers in all 152 local authorities (LAs) in England.

All of the 152 local authorities in England responded to the FOI request. A small number of LAs, which commissioned VI service support from a neighbouring authority, or were members of a consortium, gave limited responses to some questions (for example, on staff numbers) indicating that this information was not available locally but could be provided by the lead authority. In such cases, we took the responses provided by the lead LA to represent the commissioning LA/other members of the consortium.

Key findings for 2015

In two thirds of local authorities the VI service was delivered in-house by the LA. Other arrangements include a consortium/joint arrangement with other LAs, commissioning the service to a neighbouring LA or to a school. A minority of LAs commissioned the service to a voluntary or private sector organisation, or had some other arrangement in place.The findings revealed an increasingly complex picture of the way that VI services in England are organised, managed and funded, often with several layers of management.

The proportion of LAs in which the VI service was managed as part of a sensory service has increased from 42.8% in 2013 to 56.6% in 2015. Fewer VI services were part of a larger SEN service in 2015 than in 2013.

In 22 LAs (14.5%) the VI service had a reduction in its budget between 2014/15 and 2015/16, while in 54 LAs (35.5%) there was an increase.

24,865 children and young people aged up to 25 were on VI service caseloads in 2015. This is 429 fewer than were reported in 2014. A comparison of the 2014 and 2015 caseload figures for individual LAs shows that in some LAs the caseload has increased while in others there has been a reduction. The reasons for these changes are unclear but possible explanations are: improved record keeping; policy changes relating to criteria for VI service support; cohorts of particular age groups of children and young people entering or leaving the VI service caseload.

By including children and young people with VI who were known to VI services but not on their caseload (e.g. pupils in VI resourced schools, or those being educated outside the LA), a total of 26,067 were identified, who were receiving specialist educational provision for their vision impairment in 2015.

71% of LAs used the National Sensory Impairment Partnership (NatSIP) framework to determine eligibility for VI service provision. However, because VI services differed in how they applied the criteria (the minimum score that would trigger entitlement to VI service support ranged from 5% to 50% in one LA), there was very little standardisation across the country.

Just over one in ten LAs based a child’s eligibility for VI service support on the level of visual acuity (VA) withthe threshold set at 6/18 or higher, and/or required to be registered as blind or partially sighted. This raises concerns about what (if any) specialist support is available for children with VA below this threshold whose vision impairment is still likely to impact on their development and learning.

There was also a great deal of variation between LAs in their criteria for EHC plans for blind and partially sighted children and young people, with nearly one in three making no direct reference to vision impairment. The actual tone of the responses ranged from an emphasis on process – often simply citing the Graduated Response detailed in the SEND Code of Practice – to an emphasis on the individual needs of the child. Others were concerned primarily with the severity of the child’s vision impairment and/or the resource implications.

Despite the legislative changes that have extended entitlement of specialist support to young people with SEND up to the age of 25 if they are in education or training, young people over the ages of 16/18/19 belong to the group that was currently not supported by the VI service in a number of LAs. While a few LAs were actively seeking to improve provision to these older learners, it is apparent that others were struggling with the idea of supporting learners in post-school settings.

Responses to questions about the relationship between the VI service and health and social care revealed a wide range of professional working practices in place. Additional comments provided by respondents provided examples of innovative models of inter-agency collaboration, while in others there appears to be far less contact between education, health and social care.

84.2% of LAs had an established arrangement in place with Health for referring babies and children to the VI service. In 12 LAs it was unclear what (if any) referral arrangements were in place and in two LAs the VI service appeared to have no formal contact with Health.

In just under two thirds (64.5%) of LAs the person with strategic management of the VI service was a QTVI. In one in eight (12.5%) LAs the head of service did not hold a qualification in sensory impairment.

598 teachers with a QTVI or QTMSI qualification, or who were in training, were employed by VI services in 147 LAs. A further 29 were expected to begin training within the next two years. There were 16 QTVI vacancies at the time of the survey.

The number of children on QTVI caseloads varied significantly between LAs. While some variation might be expected due to the characteristics and needs of learners on VI service caseloads, in 12 LAs extremely high ratios of one QTVI to around 100 children and young people with VI were found.

Only 84 LAs (55%) employed teaching assistants (TAs) centrally – between them, they employed a total of 495 individuals. The vast majority of TAs (2,600) were recruited and employed directly by schools. At present we have no way of knowing what training these TAs have received, and how the specialist nature of their support is being supervised.

38 mobility/rehabilitation and 145 habilitation officers were employed, or commissioned, by VI services in 122 LAs. The 122 LAs included several that were members of a consortium or joint arrangement, with some staff shared by all, but employed by only one, of the member LAs.In a small number of LAs mobility support was provided by the adult social care team or bought in when needed. It would appear that in 20 LAs the VI service neither employed nor commissioned, nor bought in from another provider, specialist staff to provide mobility and independence training for children and young people. It is possible that in some of these LAs mobility support was provided but there is no indication from any of them whether or not this was the case.

Conclusion

Over the past 3 years LAs have responded in different ways to the challenges posed by cuts to public sector funding. While some LAs appear to recognise the importance of having a well resourced VI or sensory service, others seem not to appreciate the value of specialist staff and have either gone down a more generalist route, or have cut VI service staffing levels. The result is a rationing of specialist VI service provision in some LAs.

In conclusion, the current situation is one of significant variation across LAs in terms of models of organisation, management, staffing and resources, and policies and practices. For children, young people with vision impairment and their families this means that access to specialist educational provision from the VI service is a postcode lottery.

References

Keil S (2015) Local authority Vision Impairment (VI) education service provision for blind and partially sighted children and young people. Report on findings from RNIB Freedom of Information (FOI) requests 2014. RNIB

Keil S (2016) Freedom of Information (FOI) questions on local authority education provision for children and young people with vision impairment: 2015. Full report.RNIB