The best bit is the contribution by Claire Dorer CEO of the National Association of Independent and non-maintained special schools. But it's great to see cross-party support in minority-Labour-run Merton defending the real cost of special education.
I missed it at the time, but the story begins with one of those ghastly, ill-thought through scribblings that pass for journalism that the Daily Mail specialises in "Council spent £338k educating one disabled boy". It's a rambling mess of a piece but the essence is that good money shouldn't be spent on pupils like these. The Mail's readers got the point, as can be seen in the Comments that follow the article online.
I caught up with story in the form of a robust cross-party defence of the costs to Merton Council published in SWLondoner online "Political opposites set aside their differences to defend Merton Council’s decision to spend more than £300,000 on a year’s private secondary education for one disabled child"
" .... what we need to try and understand - and maybe people don’t always - is that some of our young people live with complex disabilities, and they have to be our top priority. We can’t dismiss these children from our lives. We have a legal duty to provide the right support...”
It's at the end of this article you can read Claire Dorer's contribution, describing the Mail readers' comments as "heartbreaking" and then going on to talk about the real costs of special education and "emphasised the need to raise awareness of the real costs involved in educating young people with complex SEN, as well as the positive impact that a high standard of education can have later in life."
“This is an invest-to-save spend really – it’s about intervening whilst the child is young enough that you can make a difference in their life, that you can help them manage their condition – even if it’s going to be lifelong. You can maximise their chances of being happy and healthy and making a real contribution, whether that’s paid employment or social enterprise.
Says Claire: “Most local authorities will look only at teaching and learning costs, and the national median for that is around £26,000 a year .... But that doesn’t include any therapies, it doesn’t include any social work support, it doesn’t include things like the local authority overheads, buildings; it doesn’t include transport.
“If you really added up what it would cost to offer a particular service to a young person, actually weekly boarding ends up as being a relatively cheap option and day placements again end up as being potentially cheaper than local authority equivalent packages.”
In other words, comparing apples with apples, it can now be demonstrated that non-maintained special schools like Paces School not only offer "Outstanding" special education but are likely to be easier on the overall public person than local authority maintained schools.
As the article goes on to point out, something I have not yet seen much comment on elsewhere, "Such findings will become particularly pertinent in September 2014 when, under the Children and Families Bill 2013, new “education, health and care plans” will replace the current system of SEN Statements." Basically, in a matter of a few short months time, we are all going to have to get used to comparing apples with apples. Couple that with the extended parental right provided for in the Bill to express a preference of school and the landscape of special education might even begin to look like "the biggest change in 30 years" the DfE asserts it is.
Are we in conductive education in England prepared for it?