Education, Health and Care Plans (EHC)

Education, Health and Care (EHC) plans have replaced the previous Statement of SEN and Learning Difficulty Assessment (LDA). Since September 2014 statutory assessments of SEN no longer lead to a statement. The statutory assessment process must be co-ordinated across education, health and care. It is vital that the EHC plans reflect the views, interests and aspirations of children, young people, and their parents.

How will children and young people be assessed?

The Special Educational Needs (SEN) Code of Practice sets out a definition of eligibility for statutory assessment and the EHC plan. It places emphasis on taking children and young people whose needs cannot be reasonably met through their normally resourced local mainstream provision through the EHC planning process.

A local authority must conduct an assessment of education, health and care needs and prepare an Education Health and Care plan when it considers that it may be necessary for special educational provision to be made for the child or young person through an EHC plan. This is likely to be where the special educational provision required to meet the child or young person’s needs cannot reasonably be provided from within the resources normally available to mainstream early years providers, schools and post 16 institutions and as outlined in the Local Offer.

If you would like to request an EHC Needs Assessment please complete the request form, available in the Download section of this page. Once completed please email to the Redbridge SEN Team SENteam@redbridge.gov.uk

Please click here for EHC Assessment requests of children within the Early Years Foundation Stage.

EHC Coordinated Assessment

Once it has been agreed that an EHC assessment will take place information is sought from the family, the child/young person and all of those who know the child in a professional context. As part of the statutory assessment process there is always a check to see if health or social care have any information to contribute to the assessment. Parental consent is always sought before an EHC assessment can take place.

Co-Production Meeting (CPM)

This process is person centred and involves face to face structured discussion between the family child/young person and those who work with the family, including where appropriate professionals from health and social care. Advice and information gathered through the assessment process will be collated and circulated prior to the meeting In most cases a plan will be drawn up at a Co Production Meeting (CPM) usually facilitated by the SENCO at the school where the child or young person attends. At the meeting a Co-ordinator from Redbridge SEN and Inclusion Team draws together the discussion and drafts the EHC plan.