1. Exceptional Needs Funding: Training and Update
Nicola Ulliott
SEN Panel Coordinator
ENF has been the way of funding Exceptional pupils in Hertfordshire since 2007, when it was first rolled out training was made available to embed the process with schools and professionals and we again rolled out training when changes were made to the funding system around 5 years ago.
But we are aware there has always been a need for ongoing training for SENCos new to post or for people involved in the process already but who feel they need a refresher.
We have written a training presentation which I will show you today.
What I would like to ask all of you is what else you would like to see in this new training, the questions you are frequently asked as professionals involved in the process and how you think this would be best trained out.
I will now take you through the slides, but will not go through them in detail, I will leave them up on the board for a while for you all to have time to gather any feedback.

2. What is ENF?
Exceptional needs funding is a schools led process to help support the pupils within our county with the most significant and complex needs.
Most SEN funding is set out by formula. ENF is there to support individual pupils as it is understood that funding by formula may not be able to support all the pupils across the county with the most severe and complex needs.
We will go through what is Exceptional Needs and how it works,

3. The Guidance
All Schools and settings should have a copy of the SEND Funding handbook for mainstream schools and setting
It is also available on the Grid and Herts Direct.
The guidance is updated regularly and can answer most questions re ENF
Nearly all of what I am going to tell you today can be found in the guidance.
We will show where to find the guidance and handbook and what information you would expect to find there.

4. The ENF Process Application Form Payments Cluster Meeting Feedback
Panel Meeting
Feedback
Payments
The following 2 slides are visuals of how the ENF process works, and a short explanation of each step.

5. The ENF Process New Submission to Cluster Not agreed at Cluster
Support given from peers
Resubmission may be necessary
Pupil supported by Schools Budget
Agreed at Cluster
Brought forward to panel
Agreed at Panel and feedback
Payments to school until end date of decision
Renewal may be necessary
Not Agreed at Panel, given feedback and professional support identified
Pupil supported through the Schools budget

6. How are Special Needs funded?
The School’s notional SEND budget:
1. AWPU
Main source of funding for teaching and teaching support costs (inc SENCo)
1.81% identified as SEND funding in primary schools and 1.59% in secondary Schools
We then go into detail about how pupils with SEND are funded through schools, including AWPU, additional support, notional SEN budgets, multiple cases and then ENF.

7. 2. Additional Support
Deprivation Factor - FSM / IDACI – 50% allocated to Notional SEND budget
Prior Attainment Factor: 100% Allocated to Notional SEND budget
Notional SEND Budget: inc as above and 20% mobility factor, £7.56 per 6th form pupil, 2.74% of the lump sum

8. 3. Individual ENF allocation
First £6000 / 12.5 hours funded from notional SEND budget (additional funding added to the delegated budget shares to reflect this requirement)
Multiple cases payments - paid at £2,000 per term if a school has more ENF children than its threshold on the census date.
ENF Payment – The remaining hours agreed by the panel over and above the first 12.5 hours support.

9. Multiple Cases Formula Thresholds
Primary
The threshold increases in 0.5 increments for each half a class of the school’s PAN. For example, a one-and-a-half form of entry primary school would have a multiple cases threshold of 1.5 pupils.
Modified arrangements will operate for schools with fewer than 7 year groups i.e. first, infant, and junior.
Thresholds are adjusted when a school’s on-roll number is at least one form of entry under its PAN.
The next few pages go on to explain the multiple cases thresholds for schools and when schools would receive it.

10. Multiple Cases Formula Thresholds
Secondary
The threshold increases in 0.25 increments for each half a class of the school’s PAN. For example, a five forms of entry secondary school would have a multiple cases threshold of 2.5 pupils.
(Modified arrangements will operate for schools with fewer than 5 year groups i.e. middle, upper, and )
Thresholds are adjusted when a school’s on-roll number is at least one form of entry under its PAN.

11. Early Years and 6th Form
Early Years settings do not have a formal SEN budget and therefore do not have the first 13 hours deducted from their ENF allocation
6th Form students are not covered by the notional SEN budget. They do not have the first 13 hours deducted from their ENF allocation and therefore are also not included in the multiple cases payments.

12. ENF Funding Breakdown
£6.3m from the High Needs Block, overseen by Schools Forum
Increase from £5.7m in
£2.3m of this is used to fund Multiple Case payments.
Remaining budget is split by the model indicators to the 9 DSPL areas
Budget must last 3 meetings per financial year
Committed spend from previous DSPL area meetings impacts the available spend for new applications.
This explains the ENF funding as a whole, what the budget is made up of and then how it is split over the 9 DSPLs.

13. Local Offer
All schools have signed up to the Hertfordshire Quality Offer
Through SEN Information Report schools provide details of their own “local offer”
These act as markers to assist schools, settings, cluster groups and exceptional needs panels to define what is “exceptional”
If the provision within your local offer is being offered at a high intensity or frequency it could be an indicator of exceptional provision.
Indicators of need have been developed to assist in deciding if the child’s needs are likely to be considered to be exceptional.
We will then highlight that schools should be working to their local offer and how this can be used, as well as the indicators of need to highlight whether a child may be agreed to be exceptional and if an application is necessary.

14. Exceptional Needs Funding
Funding is only available for specific interventions and should be detailed as TA hours.
ENF is to support children living within Hertfordshire, attending Hertfordshire PVIs and state funded schools
ENF in general does not support Medical needs, lunch and break support, meetings with professionals and in all cases, apart from VI needs, resources and preparation.
ENF can only be accessed in a PVI if the child is accessing the free place entitlement.
We then talk about what exceptional needs funding can and cannot be used for.

15. Applications This Term
Total number of children in receipt of ENF across the county – 1070 in as of February 2018.
Total number of pupils receiving ENF in this area –
Total number of schools receiving ENF in this area -
This page will be updated every time we roll out training to show how many pupils are receiving ENF across the county and the area that the training Is happening.

16. What is Exceptionality?

17. What is exceptionality?
Exceptional across the district
Requires a highly individualised programme of support
Supported by highly individualised learning targets
Completely dependant on high levels of support
Refer to the indicators of need documents
This part of the training looks at what is exceptionality and what needs and provision is seen as exceptional across the district.
Here we can look as a group in more detail to the indicators of need documents.

18. What is exceptionality?
Supported by adults for the majority of the time within, individualised, small group and whole class learning
Involvement of external support services with likely multi agency input
Meets the educational needs of the pupil, not medical or care needs.

19. Activity: Mock Exceptional Needs Panel
We will discuss 3 or 4 cases and decide within the group whether these are exceptional across the district or not and how many hours to award.
This activity gives people the chance to discuss cases as the panel would, to look at what information may be missing from applications, what information they would expect to see to make a decision and to look at some cases and whether they are truly exceptional or not.

20. Activity Questions you may ask about the cases;
How exceptional are those needs when measured across County?
What provision has already been put in place to meet the needs and is this clearly targeted?
How exceptional are the requirements from normal expectations and how will they make a difference to the child?
Has there been active involvement from external agencies?
Is there other sources of support the setting could access?
What is the significance of the child's needs and the impact on learning?

21. Completing the Application
Sections 1 and 2
Straightforward information about the child
Can be downloaded from SIMS pre-populated
Include transition school if it is a joint application
Free place funding information is important!
Cases are directed to each panel according to postcode
Each section of the application form is then broken down and an explanation of what we require within each part.

22. Sections 3
Follow the guidance regarding reason for application and main presenting need.
12 main categories of need, 1 in Main and list any further needs or diagnosis in other needs.
There are 5 main categories for application in the guidance.
All external professionals should be noted if they have had involvement with the child, usually within the last 18 months.

23. Use the graduated responses to assist in first deciding whether an application is appropriate.
Clearly describe the child SEND including needs and medical conditions/diagnosis applicable to the child
Comment on a range of matters; physical, communication, social, emotional, learning, behaviour, attendance, play and sensory
Show how these needs impact their learning, academic achievement, progress and access to education.

24. Achievement should be shown with appropriate, comparative and relevant assessments.
Describe the provision already in place through the schools local offer.
If a renewal, show the impact the funding has had to the child and their academic progress.

25. Make sure this section is specific and detailed.
Be specific about the type of provision required, referring to its duration, frequency and method of delivery.
Make sure this section is specific and detailed.
Cross reference to the external professionals who have advised the provision.
Make sure you show what the expected impact will be, this will be needed in any resubmission.
The panel

26. Other points to consider
Parents must be aware of the application
Short extracts from reports can be added into the form, but do not add attachments as evidence
Total request should be in hours and should directly link to the provision request.
Be clear with the start and end dates. Remember the majority of cases are awarded from the next term. i.e. awarded at the Summer panel – funding starts from September.
Provision identified as necessary for a pupil within the application must be made by the school even if ENF is not agreed.
Other points to consider, to help the writing of applications,

27. Looking at Behaviour within an ENF application
Include evidence to show intensity, frequency and severity of behaviours
Show evidence of strategies and services have been implemented before the application, evidence that they have been given time to succeed and their benefits evaluated.
Where behaviour remains extreme, show evidence of adult support having an impact
Evidence the effect the behaviour is having on the pupil’s access to education, the time within class and the safety and wellbeing of children and adults.
Behaviour we have found has become the main presenting need in a large percentage of applications we see at panel so we have some specic points of filling out a behaviour led application.

28. Supporting the ENF Process
The Handbook
Cluster Reps
SEND Panel Coordinators
SEND Officers
Schools in your area
All of the information in this presentation can be found within the SEND funding handbook, which is available on the grid and each school should have a hard copy of.
We are currently updating the handbook and this will be rolled out in the summer term, but these are tweaks rather than big changes and should not have a big impact on the training.

29. thank you
This training will be available to SENCO’s, bursars from PVIS and schools as well as professionals from HCC. We would be looking to run a range of session in the 9 DSPL areas a with a mop-up centrally in the summer term. With a termly training on going held in the east and west of the county.
We are also looking into another set of training to support panel members and cluster reps in their roles within the process to ensure there is consistency between cluster and panel decisions across the county and to support the panels to make robust, guidance based decisions.
In your packs you should all have a training feedback form, would you all please take 5 minutes to discuss the training on your table, fill in the sheet, we will then take questions from the room.