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What is a Pastoral Support Plan?

The aim of a Pastoral Support Plan (PSP) is to promote social inclusion and help to reduce the need for permanent exclusion. This guidance aims to provide both a school management process and procedural framework within a PSP in any Surrey School.

The PSP procedure and process is designed to support those pupils for whom the normal school based strategies have not been effective. A PSP is a structured intervention for pupils at risk of permanent exclusion. The aim of the PSP is to involve the pupil, parent and family in the shared challenge of improving behaviour and social skills and ensuring social and educational inclusion.

The PSP should not be used to replace the normal Special Educational Needs assessment process; pupils should still be taken through the appropriate stages of the SEN Code of Practice. Staff should consider whether a PSP, CAF, or TAC Meeting is the best way forward. It may also be more appropriate to combine targets and strategies within a Child In Need or Child Protection Conference.

A PSP is essentially a school based and owned process. Schools and Parents will for the most part, be providing the additional support, interventions, adaptations and communication that are agreed.

Given the intensive nature of a PSP, schools need to target those students whose behaviours mean that they are at risk of permanent exclusion. A number of factors may be considered including the number of fixed term exclusions (2 or 3 in one term should certainly be a trigger), integration from a managed move or starting at a school following a permanent exclusion. There is a county expectation that pupils who receive 3 or more fixed term exclusions that amount to more than 5 days exclusion will be placed on a PSP.

It is for individual school leadership and management to decide upon the number of PSP’s that it can manage at any one time but given the fact that each one will require additional intensive support over and above that that could be agreed as part of a normal Individual education Plan (IEP) and that it will run for 16 weeks it is likely that between 2-4 can be managed.

There would have to be a good reason for a student not to be on a PSP at the point of permanent exclusion. It would be expected that a PSP would have been in place within the last two terms. The

PSP process is useful in co-ordinating support and reviews of alternative packages. The decision to propose a PSP should be done in conjunction with the school’s behaviour policy.

What should already be in place?

Before initiating a PSP, the following should have been considered and/or carried out:

changes to learning environment adaptations to unstructured times

deployment of additional adults (1:1 or group work) review differentiation of curriculum

adaptations for learning style

ensure behaviour policy consistently applied review behaviour management strategies baseline behaviour assessment

discuss difficulties with student discuss difficulties with parents/carers

consult colleagues in department, key stage, pastoral team and/or SENCO regarding special educational needs

additional staff training

IEPs with smart targets and regular reviews

referral to and liaison with STT and/or EP team members and any other Outside Agencies withdrawal from lessons

flexible curriculum and/or individualised timetable use of IT

risk assessment

temporary placement at in-school unit or external Short Stay School (if available) allocation of a key worker

mediation managed move internal exclusion restorative approaches work

CAF

If it is decided that a PSP is the best way forward, the school staff member identified as being responsible for co-ordinating monitoring and reviewing a PSP needs to initiate a meeting.