Annual Review of an Education, Health and Care Plan

Guidance notes for the completion of the annual review form

Background information

The annual review form has been designed to meet the requirements of the ‘Special educational needs and disability code of practice: 0 – 25 years’.

EHC plans should be used to actively monitor children and young people’s progress towards their outcomes and longer term aspirations. They must be reviewed by the local authority as a minimum every 12 months. Reviews must focus on the child or young person’s progress toward achieving the outcomes specified in the EHC plan. The review must also consider whether these outcomes and supporting targets remain appropriate. (SEN CoP (2014) 9.166)

The review of an EHC plan and the progress that a child or young person has made towards their outcomes and longer term aspirations must focus on the content of the plan in place. For this reason the new annual review paperwork has been set out in a way that ensures it correlates closely with the EHC plan itself. The EHC plan must be a ‘live’ document that acts as a blueprint for how a child or young person will continue to work towards their outcomes and aspirations over the coming year.

The word ‘review’ leads, inevitably, to a mindset of looking backwards, which is fine to an extent, but these meetings are more than ‘reviews’ they are planning meetings as well, looking to the future, setting outcomes, planning for adulthood etc.

The review document

The document must be completed as fully as possible ensuring the information is accurate, this would include checking information such as a parent’s address and other contact details.

The attendance data should be recorded and any issues discussed. It is possible that poor attendance may lead to an outcome being identified for inclusion as part of the plan, for example, by the end of term 3 xxx’s attendance will be up to 90%.

In the list of those invited to the review, only those invited to the review need to be included, those professionals not invited can be deleted from the list.

All professionals who are involved in a child or young person’s case should be invited to a review.

Outcomes must be reviewed including whether a child has met, not met or partially met a particular outcome.

Resources and provision that has worked well should recorded and included against future outcomes. Provision and resources that have not been effective should be removed from an outcome in order that a new strategy can be followed.

Most importantly, the person chairing the review must use this document in a way that ensures that the child or young person is able to be as involved in their review meeting as fully as possible. This may mean that for some reviews the running order of the review has to be adapted to meet an individual’s need, which is fine.

For a young person in a post 16 placement with an EHC plan the right to make decisions about their plan is theirs unless they do not have the mental capacity to do so. A person is presumed to have mental capacity to make decisions unless proved not the case.

The contribution of a child or young person’s parent is an important part of the review process and the education institution should ensure to listen to these opinions and record it as part of the review process.

Even when decision making powers shift from the parent to the young person the code of practice recognises the role of the parent in supporting a young person to make decisions, or act on their behalf, and that it is likely parents will remain closely involved in the great majority of cases.

Only the relevant assessment boxes need to be kept on the annual review form. A secondary school (for pupils up to year 11) may delete the early years box and the post 16 box from their master copy of the annual review document in order to make the document more relevant and reduce the overall size of the annual review paperwork.

The philosophy of a ‘tell us once’ approach should be followed as part of the review process. Where possible, agencies should use the EHC plan review to coincide with one of their reviews. For example, children’s social care must undertake reviews of children and young people with EHC plans where there are social care needs, this review should be combined with the formal EHC annual review to prevent parents having to repeat the same information.

If a child or young person is a child in care the EHC plan review could coincide with one of the reviews in their care plan, in particular the personal education plan (PEP) element of the Care Plan.

The EHC plan should review the child or young person’s health needs, if the appropriate person was present, e.g. the Paediatrician this could include a medication review.

New outcomes should be set in order to meet an identified need. These outcomes could be to meet an education, health or social care need.

Primarily the EHC plan is a document to meet an identified educational need; therefore, a plan should always include outcomes to meet an educational need. Any appropriate educational outcome must involve a provision that is beyond what is available to all pupils, i.e. if the provision to meet an outcome is normally available to all then this is not special educational provision and therefore should not be included in the plan.

When a pupil is in Year 9 onwards outcomes should be looking at preparing the young person for adulthood, outcomes may be focussed on building upon independence skills as well as addressing education needs.

A parent or the young person has a right to request a personal budget during a review of an EHC plan.

A child or young person who is in reciept of a personal budget via a direct payement or a third party arrangement must have this arrangement reviewed, must complete an annual financial audit and the details of the proprosed personal budget should be included in section J of the EHC plan.

The annual review and any amendments to a plan must be completed by 15th February in the case of a child or young person moving between key phases of education (with the exception of a young person moving to a post 16 placement).

For young people moving from a secondary school to a post-16 placement the review and any amendments must be completed by 31st March.

Boxes that are not applicable can be removed to make the form more user friedly, i.e. remove the ‘Early Years to school’, ‘primary school to secondary school’ if the young person is at an age where they are transferring from a secondary school to a post-16 institution.

All reviews taking place from year 9 onwards must include a focus on preparing for adulthood.

Transition planning should be built into the EHC plan including recording the pupil’s views, wishes and aspirations and writing appropriate outcomes into the plan. If the pupil is likely to leave formal education in the next 12 months and the plan cease at the end of this time the annual review should consider good exit planning, for example, ensuring a smooth transition into the next phase of the young person’s life.

The recommendations of a review should be recorded as an accurate reflection of the discussions held. These are recommendations for the Local Authority to consider and should not be considered an agreement as to the outcome of a review.

The EHC plan should be looked on as a plan for the next year in order to address specific needs.

Amendments to the EHC plan should be identified including supporting evidence. A plan should be regularly amended to ensure the accuracy of the content. If a plan is not amended year on year it would suggest there may be an issue, e.g. the outcomes of the plan are too long term, the child’s provision to meet their identified needs are not apporpriate, or the pupil’s needs are such that they no longer require an EHC plan.

Not all people attending an annual review will be of the same opinion and if this is the case those differing reviews should be included in this section. A recommendation from a review is that, a recommendation, it is for the Local Authority to assess the evidence and ascertain whether changes to an EHC plan are required.

The last page includes signatures of key people involved. As a matter of good practice the pupil should sign the form to say that they have been part of the review process and are aware of the content of their plan (including recommendations from the review). Please note, there may be occasions where it is not in the best interests of a child to sign the review paperwork, for example involving issues of capacity to understand the recommendations being made.

For pupils in post-16 placements they must sign the annual review paperwork and the signature of the parent of the young person is advisable but not essential. In post-16 placements it is the young person who makes decisions about the support they receive through a plan, not the parent. This is the case unless the young person has been proven to lack the mental capacity to make decisions for themselves.