Visit to Houses of Parliament

Recently, I attended a meeting with the government at the House of Commons to discuss our Therapy Hubs Outreach project. Our school Head of Therapy, Shona Puttick, and I attended Westminster to meet with MP Adam Shockat, who is part of the government SEN focus group. It was wonderful to share the successes of the Therapy Hubs project, which has now been running for 5 years, supporting pupils and families in crisis from local mainstream secondary and primary schools.

MP Adam Shockat is Vice Chair of the APPG (All-party Parliamentary Group, who work to improve SEND provisions and outcomes for young people.  He was very interested in the Therapy Hubs project that has been taking place over the past 5 years to support SEN pupils in mainstream schools. 

Therapy Hubs has been positive for all pupils taking part in the project; it has been life-changing for some participants, providing the much-needed therapy and counselling sessions which they would not have otherwise received. The project has helped the school to build partnerships with all of the primary and secondary schools in West Sussex that have been taking part.  Sao far 4 Secondary schools and 9 primary schools have been participated and benefited from the Therapy Hubs project. 

Therapy Hubs also generated the following positive outcomes:

  • Helped to maintain placements of pupils in mainstream schools
  • Feelings of stress and anxiety have been reduced
  • Increased self-esteem and well-being
  • Attainment has improved
  • Attendance has increased
  • CAMHS referrals have been reduced
  • Primary schools reported that staff attending improved their inclusive practice
  • 100% of parents felt supported themselves, with improvement in home life

This was a wonderful opportunity to share the excellent inclusive work conducted by Muntham House School.  Therapy Hubs has a project that has been so successful with every pupil who has been lucky enough to participate.  With the current changes to Special Educational Needs provision, these are exactly the right type of project to enable special schools to support mainstream schools in their SEN provision.