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EHCP Good Practice Guide: Coming soon
Published
Gloucestershire County Council is committed to improving the information, support and opportunities offered to our families living with SEND.
In March 2025 we will publish the 'Education, Health and Care Plan (EHCP) Good Practice Guide' to support professionals who are involved in writing, amending, auditing or contributing to EHCPs.
This will not only help improve professional practice within the services that contribute to the EHC needs assessment alongside the EHCP Service, to ensure we are meeting OFSTED outstanding standards, but will also provide our families with information on what they should expect in their outstanding plans.
The Children and Families Act (2014) introduced many changes to support young people in Education with Special Educational Needs Disabilities (SEND). In Gloucestershire, we have a Graduated Pathway to support all children with additional needs, this includes the MyPlan, MyPlan+ and the Education Health and Care Plan (EHCP).
Most children and young people with additional needs can be supported using a MyPlan or MyPlan+. Schools have a duty to put support in place to make sure children and young people with additional needs have the same learning and development opportunities as their classmates.
When a child's needs are more complex and can't be met by their nursery, school or college, you can then request an EHC needs assessment, to see if an Education Health and Care Plan is appropriate.
Ensuring the quality of our EHCPs is important to us. This new guide, which was co-produced with Gloucestershire Parent Carer Forum, is a big step towards our improvement journey in enhancing the quality of EHCPs for children and young people. It will ensure that the professionals involved in producing EHCPs can be confident in knowing what ‘good’ looks like and have a standard of practice to which to refer.
It should be noted that the document is not legal guidance, and professionals should take their own advice if there is anything of which they are unsure. The document will be reviewed and updated in-line with any changes to case law.
The new Education, Health and Care Plan (EHCP) Good Practice Guide will be available to parent carers via the Local Offer: Support for Families with SEND in March 2025.