SEN and disability: required school policies

Information on all statutory policies that schools must have can be found in the Department for Education's document ' Statutory Policies for Schools' which can be downloaded from:

DfE: Statutory policies for maintained schools 

DfE: Statutory policies for academy trusts

The school, trust or early years setting must set out its SEN policy and information on its approach to supporting children and young people with SEN.

Special educational needs policy

Your SEN policy should include ……

Information about the school’s SEN provision

• objectives of the policy
• responsibility for co-ordination of SEN provision
• arrangements for co-ordinating SEN provision
• admission arrangements
• specialist SEN provision.

Information about identification and assessment procedures for pupils with SEN

• identification, assessment, monitoring and review of pupil needs and progress
• access to a broad and balanced curriculum curriculum, information and associated services
• inclusion arrangements for pupils with SEN or who are disabled
• how governors evaluate the success of provision
• complaints procedure
• facilities for pupils with SEN or who are disabled
• allocation of resources for vulnerable pupils, those with SEN or who are disabled.

Staffing policies and school partnerships

• staff training and professional development for SEND
• links to support services and school to school support for SEN
• working in partnership with parents
• transition
• links with other agencies, schools and voluntary organisations.

 Accessibility plans

Accessibility plans need to include how a school plans to:

• increase access to the curriculum for disabled pupils
• improve the physical environment to increase access to education and associated services
• make improvements in the provision of information for disabled pupils

The following link is to archived Department of Education documents on the National Archives website made available for reference use but should not be considered to reflect current Government policy or guidance:

DfE: Accessible schools: planning to increase access to schools for disabled pupils (2002)

SEN information report ('School Offer')

The governing bodies of maintained schools and maintained nursery schools and the Boards of academy schools must publish information on their websites about the implementation of the governing body’s or the board's policy for pupils with SEN. The information published should be updated annually and any changes to the information occurring during the year should be updated as soon as possible. The information required is set out in the Special Educational Needs and Disability Regulations 2014.

Further information in the DfE SEND Code of Practice 6.79 Publishing information: SEN information report

DfE: Special educational needs (SEN) and disability information on school websites

The following documents provide more information: