Introduction to the materials

There are two main purposes for this Post 16 Graduated Response Toolkit:

1. To provide guidance to providers regarding meeting the needs of young people with SEND at the Graduated Response level of The SEND Code of Practice 
   
   
2. To provide guidance to the LA to aid decision-making for Education Health and Care Needs Assessment (EHCNA) requests.

The materials are structured into the following sections:

1. Introduction

This section contains information about definitions relating to SEND, the legislation and statutory responsibilities of providers and further information on recording and funding.

2. Transition

This section provides guidance to colleges and post 16 providers about transition, including transition from school to college and also careers advice and preparing for adulthood.

3. Post 16 provider responsibilities

This section provides information about the responsibilities of the providers’ senior leadership team in meeting the needs of the young people in each area of need. 

Whole setting guidance is also available on the NASEN website.

4. Key Person/Teacher responsibilities

This section sets out the responsibilities of the key person/teacher in meeting the needs of children with SEND in their sessions.  It includes guidance statements that adults can use to assess their skills and knowledge in specific areas which is particularly useful if there are children with SEND that are challenging adult’s professional skills.

There are different areas in this section that look at assessment, curriculum content, curriculum delivery and the physical environment that can be adapted to meet the needs of the young people with SEND.

5. SEND support in colleges

This section outlines guidance about assessment and intervention that can be put into place for individual young people with SEND who need more support than is available in the setting.

It is likely that the majority of student's needs will have been identified prior to post-16 education and post 16 providers will be continuing with the interventions and support that was already in place for these students. However, in some instances special educational needs may not have been identified or student may experience some trauma that result in special educational needs, so providers may be required to identify the needs as well as provide support. 

SEND provision in college needs to focus on both ensuring curriculum access (adjustments needed in class to improve access to the curriculum) and improving individual's skills (in the specific area of need). 

Support for individual young people needs to be structured in an Assess, Plan, Do, Review cycle involving parents/carers, if appropriate, and the young people, whenever possible.   

6. Using specialist support services

This section includes guidance about using specialist support services to improve practice and also for assessment and intervention of individual young people.

Included will be referral routes to local and national services in the specific area of need.

Further information

For more information about the Graduated Response please see NASEN's guide SEN Support and the Graduated Response and also SEN support: research evidence on effective approaches and examples of current practice in good and outstanding schools and colleges produced by ASK Research and Coventry University, and funded by the Department for Education.