A pupil has SEN where their learning difficulty or disability calls for special educational provision, namely provision different from or additional to that normally available to pupils of the same age.
A child of compulsory school age or a young person has a learning difficulty or disability if he or she has a significantly greater difficulty in learning than the majority of others of the same age or has a disability which prevents or hinders him or her from making use of facilities of a kind generally provided for others of the same age in mainstream schools or mainstream post-16 institutions.
Definition of Disability
Many children and young people who have SEN may have a disability under the Equality Act 2010 – that is:
‘a physical or mental impairment which has a long-term and substantial adverse effect on their ability to carry out normal day-to-day activities.’
‘Long-term’ is defined as ‘a year or more’ and ‘substantial’ is defined as ‘more than minor or trivial’. This definition includes sensory impairments such as those affecting sight or hearing, and long-term health conditions such as asthma, diabetes, epilepsy, and cancer. Children and young people with such conditions do not necessarily have SEN, but a disabled child or young person may be deemed to have SEN if they require special educational provision.
Equality Act 2010
The Equality Act (2010)
Sefton is a fully inclusive authority and expects all settings to promote a positive ethos of inclusion. Settings are expected to welcome all pupils with diverse needs with caring and understanding, and to fully support all pupils and their families, during their time in the setting. Head Teachers, Senior Leadership Teams, SENDCOs and school staff are expected to promote this ethos.
‘The Equality Act 2010 protects the rights of groups of people who share ‘protected characteristics.’ For schools, the protected characteristics are: race, disability, sex, religion or belief, sexual orientation, pregnancy and maternity and gender reassignment. In England and Wales, the Act applies to all maintained and independent schools, including academies, and maintained and non-maintained special schools. The schools’ duties also apply to pupil referral units. Schools must not discriminate and must publish information and equality objectives to show how they are complying with the ‘public sector equality duty’. Schools can take positive action to address patterns of disadvantage - e.g., low participation in some school activities by pupil groups’. Nasen Teacher Handbook, 2024
Schools must:
- Publish an accessibility plan, covering the physical environment of the school, access to the curriculum and how information is being made more accessible for disabled pupils.
- Publish disability information in the school’s SEN Information Report.
- Make reasonable adjustments so that disabled pupils are not put at a disadvantage
All schools have duties under the Equality Act 2010 towards individual disabled children and young people. They must make reasonable adjustments, including the provision of auxiliary aids and services for disabled children, to prevent them being put at a substantial disadvantage. These duties are anticipatory – they require thought to be given in advance to what disabled children and young people might require and what adjustments might need to be made to prevent that disadvantage. Schools also have wider duties to prevent discrimination, to promote equality of opportunity and to foster good relations. SEN Code of Practice, 2015
Medical conditions
‘The Children and Families Act 2014 places a duty on maintained schools and academies to plan to support pupils with medical conditions.
Individual healthcare plans will normally specify the type and level of support required to meet the medical needs of such pupils. Where children and young people also have SEN, their provision should be planned and delivered in a co-ordinated way with the healthcare plan. Schools are required to have regard to statutory guidance ‘Supporting pupils at school with medical conditions’’ SEND Code of Practice, 2015.