How to get support?

We know that it can be really difficult to see your child upset. One of the best things you can do is calmly listen to your child and acknowledge how real their feelings are to them.

It is important that you share your concerns as early as possible with school staff. EBSA can be complex but it is important that everyone is working together to support your child.

A plan should be made between your child, you, and the school to help your child. Your child’s views should be at the centre of that plan. We have found asking your child what the first step they feel they can achieve is can be really helpful. Steps should be small and the plan should be regularly reviewed between you and the school (we recommend at least every 2-4 weeks).

What can you expect the school to do?

• Listen carefully to you and your child. They should acknowledge the challenges faced by your child and you as their parent or carer.
• Maintain regular contact with you and your child, even during extended periods of non-attendance (at least twice weekly).
• You and your child should have a named member of staff as a link person.
• Follow the Lancashire Multi-agency Flowchart in supporting your child. This can be found on page 14 of the Emotionally based school avoidance (EBSA) guidance.
• Work together with you and your child to find out what difficulties your child is experiencing and find ways of making school a happier place and improve their attendance.
• Together you should make a plan that outlines what the next steps will be. It is important that adults take your child’s lead in identifying what is an achievable first step.
• Goal-setting should be done collaboratively with you and your child, ideally using the Target Monitoring Evaluation resource in the Lancashire EBSA Guidance. A date for review should be agreed within a 2-week period.
• Respond to any school-based needs, such as academic support, dealing with bullying or support with social relationships.
• Consider the support your child might require when they arrive at school. This might include meeting with a friend or key adult at a specific place and time, using a quiet space to settle before school starts, engaging in a preferred activity or being given a responsibility such as a monitor role.
• If difficulties persist the school should consider requesting involvement from other professionals including their link educational psychologist.

Lancashire schools told us that they wanted training and resources to be able to support children and their families. This is now available to schools and more information can be found on the Emotionally based school avoidance (EBSA) guidance for professionals.

It is possible that there may be setbacks when following the plan. It is important that these are anticipated and solutions are found. If setbacks happen, whilst this can be difficult, try to keep an optimistic approach. If your child is not able to attend school on one day, start again the next day. At times, steps in the plan may need to be revisited. It is also important to remember it is likely to be more difficult after a school holiday, period of illness or after the weekend. If your child is finding  the current plan too difficult, this may tell us that the next steps were too ambitious and need to be reviewed.

You may feel tempted to change schools, however, research tells us that often difficulties will re-emerge in the new school and whenever possible it is normally better to try to resolve the issue in the current school.