Yesterday, the Department for Education (DfE) published the Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) and Alternative Provision (AP) Green Paper: ‘Right support, right place, right time’.

Skills Builder Partnership includes more than 70 SEND and AP educational settings, as well as impact organisations that deliver programmes for children and young people with SEND or in AP settings. We understand first-hand just how impactful high quality support for learners can be.

We endorse the paper’s aspiration to deliver targeted, timely, and tailored provision for learners with SEND and in AP. The Government’s pledge to provide earlier and longer-term intervention is also a welcome change.

‍

The role of essential skills

However, if the Government wants to boost outcomes for learners and realise its goal of inclusivity and accessibility within both mainstream education and specialised settings, it must create ample and consistent opportunities for all learners to build essential skills.

Essential skills including communication, interpersonal, problem solving and self-management skills are at least as important for individuals with SEND or in AP settings as their peers.

Our research shows that there are clear consequences to not supporting learners with SEND or in AP to build their essential skills. Young people who attended an AP or SEND setting often have significantly lower essential skill scores than their peers: 85% score below 54, with an average skill score of 22, compared to 49% of young people at non-selective state school with an average of 55. This then goes on to negatively affect their wellbeing, impair their academic performance by 55%, limit their earning potential by up to £5,900 annually, and halve their probability of being in work or education.

An existing standard for essential skills for SEND and AP learners

An effective standard for building these skills has already been created in partnership with AP and SEND settings, and other specialist organisations: the Skills Builder Expanded Universal Framework. This Expanded Framework breaks progression in essential skills down into explicit, tangible skill steps, supporting learners to develop their strengths and skillsets and apply them across a range of contexts.

Our partners already use this model to successfully build the essential skills of their learners, better equipping them for the rest of their lives. We believe this should be a provision available to all learners with special educational needs or disabilities, as well as those being educated in Alternative Provision settings.

‍

Tom Ravenscroft, CEO at Skills Builder Partnership, commented:

“This paper goes to show that the objectives of the SEND review and Skills Builder Partnership are closely aligned. As the Government simultaneously renews its focus on both SEND and AP provision and bridging the skills gap via the Skills Bill, it must connect the two and integrate effective essential skills teaching for every learner.

“Everyone has the capacity to improve their essential skills, and to benefit from doing so. It’s up to the Government - and all of us - to make teaching them truly inclusive for every learner, everywhere.”

‍

Learn more about Skills Builder Partnership

Skills Builder Partnership is a not-for-profit social enterprise. It unites more than 800 education institutions, employers and impact organisations around the Skills Builder Universal Framework and six principles of best practice to develop the eight essential skills that everyone needs to succeed.

To read Skills Builder Partnership’s latest publications, see skillsbuilder.org/insights.

For any enquiries, please contact Eleanor Collard, Communications Associate, at eleanor.collard@skillsbuilder.org, or Erica Popplewell, External Affairs Manager, at erica.popplewell@skillsbuilder.org.

‍