The government has been accused of making a “misguided” decision by not including any special schools or alternative provision (AP) settings in the first wave of its new behaviour and attendance hubs.
The Department for Education announced the first 21 schools to be included at the start of the academic year, but none were dedicated special or AP institutions.
The omission has led sector leaders to voice concerns about how much value the government is placing on the expertise of specialist settings as it plans major system reform for pupils with special educational needs.
Tom Bennett, behaviour and attendance ambassador for the government, told Vlog that the DfE planned to address the lack of special and AP schools in “future rounds of application”.
But sector leaders have questioned the decision not to include special schools and AP from the outset as the government seeks to improve behaviour and attendance.
New behaviour and attendance hubs
Warren Carratt, chief executive of Nexus Multi Academy Trust, made up of 19 academies that are predominantly special schools in Yorkshire and the Midlands, said: “It’s hard to not see this as a political choice by the new government, which is really unhelpful and misguided.
“Under the previous government, one of our special schools was in the process of being confirmed as an attendance hub. After the general election in 2024, this was put on hold and appears to have been abandoned entirely.”
Margaret Mulholland, SEND and inclusion specialist at the Association of School and College Leaders, said: “Leaders of AP and special schools have a huge amount of knowledge and expertise to share and it would be a mistake for this to be overlooked.
“We understand that more attendance and behaviour hubs are going to be rolled out as the year progresses and sincerely hope this oversight will be corrected.”
She also warned that more needs to be done to assist all schools with behaviour and attendance challenges.
“Investing in education and wider public services that support children and families is a necessity,” she added.
Mr Carratt told Vlog that he is worried that the line-up of the first wave of hubs reflects an “emergent trend” that special and AP schools hold “no value in the current education system and should be ignored”.
“We have some of the most complex circumstances to manage and our special and AP schools do amazing work with pupils and families, like so many up and down the country.
“To deliberately ignore this expertise is not just disrespectful to the hard work of the sector - it’s an act of self-harm as it obfuscates that which could and should be facilitated”, he said.
The DfE has pushed back on the suggestion that it is ignoring special schools.
A spokesman said: “This government inherited a SEND system on its knees - which is why, through our Plan for Change, we will restore the confidence of families up and down the country.
“It is untrue to say we are ignoring special and alternative provision schools. We have only just announced the first 21 schools who will be establishing new attendance and behaviour hubs, and we are intending to appoint up to 90 lead schools across the country.”
Rob Gasson, the chief executive of Wave Multi Academy Trust, which is made up of 11 AP settings, medical academies and special schools in the South West, highlighted the value of the sector to the government’s efforts to improve attendance.
He said: “If the government wish to explore attendance barriers for the most vulnerable and challenging pupils who are being failed by the current approach, AP would be an excellent place to gather the voices for whom that approach has failed.”
Mr Gasson added that the first wave of new behaviour and attendance hubs felt like a “hotchpotch” of previous schemes.
Dr Nic Crossley, the CEO of Liberty Academy Trust, which runs three special schools for autistic pupils, said: “We are really frustrated that no special or AP schools have been identified as leads or partners.
“The concern we’ve got is that by excluding us, this therefore sends a message that there’s nothing to be learned from any of our settings, and that couldn’t be further from the truth. Because there are some really outstanding examples of practice for behaviour, particularly for children with special educational needs. We do really feel like it’s an oversight that we are not included as having a lead or a partnership role.”
‘Getting the model right to begin with’
Mr Bennett said: “We want to make sure we are getting the model right to begin with but will then move to support schools in this area. AP is one of the most important areas to get right, and some of the best practice is to be found in that sector.”
Specialist settings had been included in the previous government’s hubs programme. The Conservative government initially launched its behaviour hubs programme in 2021 - a £10 million scheme that included AP schools in the first 22 announced.
And in 2023 the previous government also announced new attendance hubs, which included St Giles School, a special school in Nottinghamshire.
The Labour government announced £1.5 million of investment in new Regional Improvement for Standards and Excellence (RISE) behaviour and attendance hubs in May of this year.
Three months later, the first 21 out of 90 schools that are going to be involved in the hubs were announced - but none were dedicated special or AP institutions.
A Vlog investigation last year highlighted concerns that the value of special schools could be overlooked as the government SEND reforms are expected to place an increased emphasis on getting more pupils with additional needs into mainstream schools.
Concerns were also raised when Vlog revealed that the former minister tasked with reforming SEND, Catherine McKinnell, visited no special schools for at least four months after the general election.
And earlier this year, Mr Carratt told Vlog he was “appalled” at DfE criticism of the former Conservative government for creating “very large numbers” of special-school places for pupils, some of whose needs “could reasonably be met in mainstream schools”.
The DfE’s comments came in a submission to the Commons Education Select Committee’s inquiry Solving the SEND Crisis.
A DfE spokesperson today said the department was establishing hubs in mainstream primary and secondary schools in the first instance but will strengthen support for AP and special schools through the hubs programme, and will share more information in due course.
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