Context: Prior to taking part in case review workshops, it can be beneficial to reflect on what ideal looks like for children and young people in your local area. This tends to work best when you focus on thinking outside the bounds of the constraints and challenges of your current system. This case study looks at the approach taken by a large DBV local authority that conducted three different case review workshops with over 25 partners from across the system in attendance.
What they did: Given the high level of engagement, this local authority took time to carefully define the questions asked in each case review before splitting into separate breakout discussions. One of the key discussions they were looking to investigate was:
“Is this child or young person in the ideal setting, or receiving the ideal support to help them achieve their long-term goals or aspirations?”
In order to encourage everyone’s input, they created a poll to give attendees the opportunity to share their thoughts on what an ideal outcome means to them.
What they found: Image 1 illustrates the key themes discussed at the workshop – the bigger the word appears, the more frequent the response. Talking about the most common responses such as ‘happiness’ and ‘realistic’ generated a discussion amongst the group, which helped steer the conversation and maintain a consistent structure when reviewing cases on an individual basis.
What you can do: Every local area will have a different approach to case reviews, but it can be useful to consider how best to engage the partners in the room. They should not be seen as a SEND service performance review, but a chance to hear the views of partners representing a variety of roles across the system.
Context: This case study walks through the combined insights gathered by a large metropolitan borough from 28 case reviews completed over the course of three different workshops. Participants were from a range of disciplines, reviewing cases of primary age pupils in mainstream and MSS and secondary age pupils in MSS and INMSS.
What they did: To understand the key themes coming out of case reviews, the local authority studied the data in several different ways:
Graph 1 shows the proportion of children and young people that professionals felt achieved an ideal outcome. This question represents the conclusion of an in-depth discussion on each case.
Graph 2 looks at these cases in more detail, showing the specific areas that were deemed non-ideal if professionals felt that the child or young person could have achieved a better outcome.
What they found: In this example, professionals found that 69% of the children reviewed could have achieved a better outcome. For this local authority, it was evident that the type of provision and timing of support received were the most common barriers to achieving an ideal outcome.
What next? These are areas they might want to explore further, either by looking at the case review data in more detail, or through other diagnostic investigations.
What they did: To understand the impact of the type of provision on children’s outcomes, they decided to break down the cases further. Table 1 shows the proportion of ideal placements in the three key provisions: MSS, mainstream and INMSS. In cases where the provision was considered non-ideal, participants were asked which provision would better support the child in achieving their goals and aspirations.
What they found: Table 1 shows that only 5/15 children were achieving an ideal outcome in MSS, as professionals felt that the majority of them could have been better supported in a mainstream setting. Similarly, despite a smaller sample size of cases, this table indicates that some children and young people being supported in INMSS could achieve better outcomes in resource provision.
What you can do: Sometimes, it can be difficult to draw accurate conclusions from a case review, especially given that you are not talking to the child or young person directly. In cases that are deemed non-ideal, it is important to have an in-depth discussion on the key milestones in the child’s education journey that led them to a particular placement or level of support. However, this can occasionally result in disagreements amongst the group, making it challenging to gauge a consensus in the room. In these scenarios it is best to move the conversation on and disregard the case from further analysis, rather than driving the case review to a conclusion. By adopting this approach, you can be confident that the data collected is an accurate representation of the views of all participants in the workshop.
What they did: At the end of each case review, this local authority gathered the key themes that professionals felt were most significantly contributing to the child’s outcome. This gave them the ability to assess the overarching barriers and constraints within the SEND system from a diverse range of cases.
What they found: As shown in Graph 3, lack of parental confidence in mainstream settings was the most frequently discussed theme during case reviews, often underpinned by a variety of reasons that needed further exploration. This is aligned with the data in Table 1, which suggested that some children and young people in specialist placements could be better supported to achieve their goals in a mainstream setting.
Key considerations and next steps: For this local authority, case review data proved to be very helpful when deciding which deep dives to pursue in the later stages of the diagnostic.
To explore the theme of parental confidence further, they conducted listening forums with members of the PCF and SENDIASS to better understand the reasons behind their concerns in the ability of mainstream settings to create an inclusive environment for children and young people with SEND.
