What is an Education, Health and Care needs assessment?
What is an Education, Health and Care needs assessment?
What is an Education, Health and Care needs assessment?
Even with some extra support from school or college, some children and young people need more help to learn or make progress. School or college staff, parents/carers or young people (over the age of 16) can apply for an Education, Health and Care needs assessment (EHC assessment for short).
An EHC assessment looks at what support you need at school or college. As part of the assessment, people will gather information from you, school/college, parents/carers and other professionals to understand:
what you would like to achieve in the future,
what you do well (your strengths)
what you need more help with (your needs)
What helps you
Your views are a really important part of the EHC assessment.
Who can ask for an EHC assessment?
You can request an EHC assessment yourself if you are between age 16 (after you finish Year 11) and 25 (up until the day of your 25th birthday) AND:
You and/or adults who know you well think you have SEND;
Your school or college need additional funding (money) so they can [MG1] to give you the support you need.
Your school or college, or your parents/carers can also apply for an EHC assessment with your agreement.
If you are below the age of 16, your school and/or your parents/carers can apply for an EHC assessment on your behalf.
What happens next and how long does it take?
Within 6 weeks of receiving a request for an EHC assessment, the local authority must decide if they are going to do the assessment. It is usually the SEN Team who tell you about this decision. The SEN Team will lead the EHC assessment process.
If the decision is made to start an EHC assessment (you might hear the phrase, "yes to assess"), the SEN Team will ask the people who help and support you to tell them about the types of support you need at school or college. These people might include:
YOU – It is very important that you are involved and that your ideas, hopes, and goals for the future are at the heart of the assessment.
School or college.
Parents/carers and others who support you.
An Educational Psychologist.
Your doctor, therapist, or Social Worker (if you have one).
Other people or professionals who know you well or have been working with you.
What happens at the end of the assessment?
The SEN Team and other professionals will look at all the information and reports they have received and decide whether they think that an Education, Health and Care Plan (EHCP) is needed. The decision they make is either "yes" (an EHCP is needed) or "no" (an EHCP is not needed).
The local authority might decide that an EHCP is not needed if they think that your school or college can continue to support you without any extra funding. You and/or your parents/carers and your school or college can say that you do not agree with this decision.
If the local authority agrees to an EHCP, they will use all the information they have collected to write a draft version of an EHCP. This is not yet the final version. The EHCP is all about you and your strengths and needs; you, your parents/carers and school or college will get a copy of your draft EHCP. If you don't agree with what it says, you can ask for changes to be made.
Once you, your parents/carers and school/college are happy with the information in the EHCP, they will make a final version.
What is in the EHCP?
The EHCP includes lots of information all about you! This includes things that you like and enjoy, people who are important to you and information about your school, college, or where you are learning (this might be an apprenticeship if you are learning how to do a certain job).
The EHCP has different sections, which are usually given a letter (Section A, Section B and so on). You can learn more about the different sections below:
Section A: your views, interests and hopes for the future (and those of your parents/carers too, depending on your age).
Section B: Information about your special educational needs. This might relate to your learning ("Cognition and Learning"), your emotions, wellbeing, and mental health ("Social, Emotional and Mental Health"), your language, communication and social skills ("Communication and Interaction"), and your physical health and/or sensory needs ("Physical and Sensory").
Section C: Any health needs that you may have will be included here (e.g. a doctor or nurse may add information to this section).
Section D: Any social care needs that you may have will be included here (e.g. if you have a Social Worker, they might add to this section).
Section E: The outcomes that you are working towards – these will have been agreed together with you and/or your parents/carers. Outcomes are written in positive language and are things you would like to achieve in the future.
Section F: Details of the support that is needed to help you work towards your goals.
Section G: Details of any support for your health that you may need.
Section H: Details of any support at home or with family that you may need.
Section I: This section shows the name and type of school or college that you will attend.
Section J: This section includes information about funding (money). Sometimes there is information in this section about Personal Budgets[MG1] . A Personal Budget is an amount of money that is used to meet some of the outcomes in your EHCP. A young person (aged 16 or over) or parents/carers can ask for a Personal Budget.
Section K: Copies of information or reports about you, your strengths and needs will be included in this section. This is information that has been used to put together your EHCP.
Remember, your EHCP is all about you! It is important that you and/or your parents/carers feel that it describes you well.