For the first time ever, they appointed an external SEND Commissioner - John Coughlan - to drive improvement of Birmingham’s SEND services. While I’ve certainly experienced worse elsewhere, the SEND service he ran in Hampshire was light years away from good. So it was a surprise to all of us to see that he’d been appointed to sort out Birmingham SEND. Thousands of challenges, often via the SEND Tribunal, almost always successful, repeatedly revealing Birmingham LA SEND decision-making for what it is: serially flawed, and frequently unlawful. The DfE Commissioner heads a “SEND Improvement Board”, which kicks off every meeting with a case study.

Source: The Guardian February 16, 2023 20:21 UTC