Do you want to know what your forum does? 

My name is Sabiha and I have recently taken over the chair role of the Birmingham Parent Carer Forum from the lovely Vickey Weaver.

I present here the Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) Newsletter from the Local Authority and Health (NB: this is not our own newsletter - watch this space for that coming soon! It gives information on what the LA is doing and how the forum is involved. The results of the second parental survey mentioned will be published soon along with other exciting and up to date news about what’s happening in Birmingham.

​Birmingham Parent Carer Forum is keen to build our membership and hear from our parent carers so we’re able to take feedback to the people who matter and make a real difference on the ground. Please support us with this by completing a very simple Join Us Form and helping spread the word. Thank-you

Birmingham are asking parents and carers to complete a survey. It will take about 10-15 mins.
This is to understand how recent changes and improvements (see below) have impacted on children and families. The link to the survey is below:

​www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/XJGYZ3J

The survey will close on 14 June 2019. See below for more background information

In June 2018, Birmingham was inspected by Ofsted and the CQC. The purpose of the inspection was to review the implementation of the special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) reforms set out in the Children and Families Act 2014.
 
Following the inspection, Birmingham City Council and Birmingham and Solihull Clinical Commissioning Group were required to submit a Written Statement of Action (WSOA) to address significant area of weakness in the local area’s practice.
 
A partnership comprising of Birmingham City Council, Birmingham CCG, Birmingham Children’s Trust and Birmingham Community Healthcare Foundation NHS Trust is working together to deliver a new and improved SEND service over the next 18 months.

Since the first survey took place in November 2018 there have been improvements in:

- Customer service and responding to email and phone calls
- How all services are contributing to Education Care and Health Plans
- The way the ‘voice’ of young people is heard in understanding their ambitions
- The way staff are trained
- How young people aged 14 and above are supported to become young adults
- The launch of a new Parent and Carer Forum
- How we are working with parents and carers, and listening to the feedback that they give us.
- Investment in NHS therapy services to reduce waiting times, and improved support whilst children are waiting.
- The way complaints are managed and how we are learning from complaints

Join us for the launch of the new Birmingham Parent Carer Forum.

Thursday 28th March 2019 7pm -9pm
Edgbaston Cricket Ground

Our Brilliant Speakers are:
Lana Grant, Author of ‘From Here to Maternity, Pregnancy and Motherhood on the Autism Spectrum’
and
Shauna Delaney, Speech & Language Therapist

Find out how we can work together to improve SEND services in Birmingham 

Refreshments Available.