Reflections on Limmud Conference

20th February 2023Ali Durban

Sarah Sultman, Gesher Co-Founder

Over the past decade, we’ve been on a journey to launch Gesher, with seven years as a flourishing school following three years of deep research and engagement with the sector to anchor our plans.

Myself and my co-founder, Ali Durban, have learned many valuable lessons about what it takes to set up an organisation from scratch – and yet how far we still have to go to inspire the wider education sector about what needs to change to achieve equity for children with SEN and those who learn differently.

We’ve been building relationships with people to share our learning. We are particularly keen to share how we designed and built our school – creating a blueprint around a vision, purpose and design principles that we carry into everything we do.

Although Gesher is a special school, the idea of using a blueprint to define your work is not limited to the creation of a school. Our approach provides plenty of ideas for youth movements, communities and other education organisations.

In pursuit of our aims to reach a wider audience, at the end of last year, Ali and I were delighted to be invited to speak at Limmud Conference at the NEC in Birmingham to people of all ages and interests from across the Jewish community.

Limmud Conference is an annual five-day learning experience that brings together thousands of people to celebrate Jewish culture through arts, dance, song, book reviews and talks. Here we delivered two sessions: one on the ‘Gesher Blueprint – from start-up to Outstanding’ and the other on ‘SEN and the system’.

We were pleased to welcome educators, parents and adults with SEN to our first session to hear about our journey to build Gesher. As one attendee, Tal Bassali from Zehud Jewish Online School said:

“I was fascinated that someone had re-invented, redesigned something in education – the idea that anything was broadly by design was exciting to me. Most solutions need to be reverse-engineered.”

Our second session on ‘SEN and the system’ again drew an audience of parents of children who learn differently, educators and local authority employees with a SEND interest who asked us questions about our personal experiences and sought advice and support on how to navigate the complexities of the system.

While both sessions offered us a brilliant chance to share ideas, listen and contribute to other people’s work and lives, we were aware that we rarely reach beyond a SEND audience when we talk to people.

Our aim of broadening our reach means we want to engage the wider world of education to help achieve greater understanding and inclusivity for children who learn differently, but also because we believe that we can learn from each other.

 

 

Ditch the Green Paper ….

2nd November 2022Ali Durban

by Ali Durban, Co-Founder Gesher School.

With the constant merry-go-round of Education Ministers and no appointment of a SEND minister since Kelly Tolhurst, we have been looking at what has progressed with the Green Paper since its submission in July. The answer is not much – other than an exchange in the form of a letter to current Minister of Education MP Robert Halfon, (and former Chair of the Education Select committee) from former Minister of Education, Kit Malthouse who writes:

‘We are proposing to establish local SEND and AP partnerships. These partnerships would be responsible for delivering a local inclusion plan which sets out the provision that will be made available in line with the national standards.’

To be clear, the Children and Families Act 2014 is the national standard (as opposed to a local inclusion plan), it already sets out a legal duty on LAs to secure and maintain Special Educational Provision through an EHCP. If provision is specified and quantified properly in an EHCP and the general principles of section 19 upheld (the need for the LA to have regard for what will help the child or young person to achieve the best possible educational and other outcomes), then an inclusion plan is not necessary.

What does need to be established is a clear accountability framework. Local Authorities need to be held to account when they do not uphold the legal standard (namely the Children and Families Act). At present the only setting for this is tribunal. It can take parents years to reach tribunal level, and the journey to get there is arduous, exhausting and often quite traumatic. Shockingly, around 95% of tribunals are upheld. This stark figure reflects that one of the biggest weaknesses of the system is in fact Local Authorities not doing what they should do legally. Establishing ‘new partnerships’ to deliver what is already written in statute will without doubt add another layer of delay to families trying to achieve the appropriate provision and outcomes for their child.

Tragically the human cost in all of this is the child or young person, who is at this point often in crisis.

Kit Malthouse goes on to write ‘The local inclusion plan will inform the tailored list of settings from which parents and carers are able to choose provision where their child requires an education, health and care plan (EHCP). The expectation is that all schools on the list will be settings that can meet the child’s special educational needs as identified in their EHC needs assessments. This aims to give parents and carers clarity on what is available locally which may still include mainstream, special, independent, or out of borough provision. Our intention is that this will lead to greater transparency about what is available for children and young people in their local school and greater clarity about how it can be provided. We also aim for this to improve the choice offered to parents and carers by suggesting options they may not have otherwise considered’.

This ambiguous statement shows a deep lack of knowledge of the SEND system. It infers freedom of choice.

However, choice is something that many families of children with SEND have never had.

The tailored list that Mr Malthouse refers to already exists in the form of a local offer. This list is drawn up by the Local Authority and typically based on cost. It does not and could not list a school to meet each and every need because:

● There is a lack of provision across the UK and the quality can differ hugely between LAs. Figures obtained by the newspaper ‘Schools Week’ show that over half of special schools had more pupils on roll than the number commissioned by their council. This was a 15% rise from 2017-18. There simply isn’t enough provision in-borough or nationally to meet need.

● Much of the provision comes out of the independent sector. In order to make the local offer list, a school must agree to section 41 – reciprocal duty to co-operate with the local authority on arrangements (admissions); this means that LA’s loosely control admissions and could see a school end up with a very mixed and challenging cohort of children. For this reason, many independent schools choose not to be part of the local offer.

There is no indication of what will happen if there isn’t an appropriate school on the list. Will parent’s once again need to battle to reach a tribunal to access the provision they need, whilst, once again, (same story here
) the child is left in crisis?

There is no mention in Kit Malthouse’s letter of placing the child and their needs at the centre of decision-making. A true local inclusion plan would see a timely and thorough multi-disciplinary assessment, followed by the family and LA working together to find the right placement with the child’s needs at the centre of all decision-making.

The reality is a 2-3 year wait for a full assessment, which is often not accurate because there is a vested interest to keep ‘need’ to a minimum (if at all) in order that there is less of a requirement to procure an EHCP and LA spend. When it comes to placement, the LA’s decision-making is based on budget and very often they will write “mainstream school” or the next cheapest placement in Section I.

Kit Malthouse’s letter highlights the disparity between what the central Government thinks inclusion is, versus the reality of what children, young people and their families face. 

We know the system is broken. Report after report after report has evidenced that children with SEND and their families are being consistently damaged and failed by the system. Much of it might be legally questionable. The proposed changes in the Green Paper continue to raise significant concerns as to the future of SEND provision.

What we need is a long-term plan for education, designed with those who bring their lived experience to a collaborative and inclusive process. We need to take the 7000+ responses from the Green paper review, analyse and publish the responses, as Tania Tiororro of Special Needs Jungle recommends.  She also writes:

‘DELAY further plans for improvement, DITCH the Green Paper in its current form and PUBLISH a straight analysis of the consultation as soon as possible

And perhaps most importantly, we need someone bold and brave who is willing to make real change and for once, put this group of children and young people and their needs first.

Our journey to Outstanding: How our second Ofsted inspection has proved real change is possible.

12th October 2022Ali Durban

by Ali Durban, Gesher Co-Founder

Gesher School started life almost 10 years ago.  An idea driven by a difficult lived experience of the education system for our own children and a vision and desire to create something better for many other children.  The first couple of years were intense.  Sarah, my co-founder, and I met in a school playground, at the time we had children in the same class at the school.  We both had full time jobs, young families and, although we were educated, neither of us had a background in education. 

It was an ambitious project.

And so, we educated ourselves, researching data, visiting schools across the UK and understanding the daily struggles of the unmet needs of what we discovered to be thousands of children and young people with mild to moderate learning differences.  

We knew there was a desperate need for change, something transformative.  We began a dialogue with our local Jewish community in North London, and advocated that, with the right start in life, this marginalised group of children and young people, who were typically under-served and failed by the current education system, could have different outcomes in life.  

We surrounded ourselves with experts and poured the very best of our shared knowledge into our collective vision.  However, translating an idea into a reality needs more than passion, purpose, and knowledge, it needs funding.  

So, at the same time we learnt to fundraise and to share our vision with people who cared about this group of children and their outcomes in life as deeply as we did.  They too believed that real change was possible. We call them Gesher Champions and together we raised £2m to kickstart Gesher.

In 2017, Gesher opened as a primary special school in Cricklewood with seven children who were differently able and who had learning differences. Seven families who had taken that leap of faith with us. These children were going to have a different educational experience. The feeling on the first day of seeing those children was immense.  A year later OfSTED visited and judged Gesher to be Outstanding in all Areas and, as the inspector shared his views, we all cried tears of joy. 

The school continued to develop and grow until eventually our site was full, with waiting lists and our primary children who were graduating had no specialist secondary schools to progress onto.  Then the pandemic hit, and amidst the challenges of supporting our children and families we were desperately looking for premises to expand and once again the funds to support our growth.

The universe tilted in our direction and in 2020, Gesher relocated to Pinner and opened as an all-through school, at full capacity it will be a school for 120 students aged 5 to 16.  To date we have raised over £5m with our Gesher Champions to support this second phase of growth.  Our vision remains the same, to build upon the success of the primary school and deliver an exceptional learning environment for children and young people who are differently able.  

We have been working hard over the last two years to create a new evidence-based model of teaching and learning for students with SEN that is academically rigorous with the long-term ambition of sharing our practice with other schools and learning communities.  Joining the dots and creating system change from the ground upwards.  

This September, Ofsted visited a second time and, under the new inspection framework judged Gesher to be Outstanding in all Areas again.  Given that we were expecting a ‘Good’ under the new framework, once again we were floored and in tears. In particular, the inspectors noted:

Pupils receive an exceptional quality of provision. Leaders have designed an ambitious curriculum which is taught by the school’s expert staff. 

Together, the curriculum and therapies encourage pupils’ independent living skills and emotional well-being very successfully. 

Therapists, teachers and teaching assistants work together seamlessly as one team. They truly understand how to meet pupils’ varied special educational needs. While staff are nurturing, they also have high expectations of all pupils. As a result, pupils work hard and learn well.  

We are all immensely proud of this. 

Gesher is a learning community filled with agency, purpose and passion which puts children and young people at the heart of school life and this achievement is more than an endorsement. 

This is a signal of hope for thousands of differently-abled children and young people and perhaps most importantly – an offering of what is possible in education.

 

-ends-

 

Siddur Lakol – an inclusive prayer book

13th July 2022Ali Durban

By Sarah Sultman, Co-Founder Gesher School.

Chagigat Siddur is very much a right of passage in our Jewish community schools, a junior coming of age experience where children receive their first siddur or prayer book.

I can remember my own in 1984, aged eight, decorating my blue Singer’s siddur with watermelon stickers and pieces of felt. I can remember my daughters’ and the colourful shiny wrapping paper we selected together to cover their new siddur.

This ceremony has always been a part of the school year to mark the point in a child’s life when having learnt tefilot – how to pray – in the classroom, they are given their own siddur. It is a statement from the older generation of teachers and parents to the pupils that says: ‘Your prayers are yours and relevant to you, G-d is there for you for you to have a relationship with, and so now you have reached an age when it is yours to own’.

I still, to this day, have my Singer’s siddur with the watermelon.

A siddur for everyone

For many of our children at Gesher, accessing the text of the siddur is not possible. In school, we use a ‘picture exchange communication system’ with ‘widgets’ – or pictorial symbols – instead of text to help pupils understand what’s being asked of them and for them to express what they’d like to do or say.

And so last month, Gesher staff and pupils were delighted to welcome the Chief Rabbi for a very special Chagigat Siddur where we shared a new Siddur Lakol, meaning ‘Siddur for Everyone’.

The first prayer book of its kind for any faith, the Siddur Lakol is thoughtful, inclusive and designed with careful colours, easy-to-read font sizes and Hebrew transliterated into English so that anyone can follow spoken Hebrew prayer.

Importantly, and uniquely, the whole siddur has been fully translated into widgets so children can fully understand their dialogue with G-d through prayer.

Making prayers accessible to all

The Siddur Lakol comes from an unprecedented collaboration of community organisations including Gesher that want to make tefillah – prayers – accessible to all.

What is beautiful about Siddur Lakol is that it is not just aimed at those with learning difficulties but all mainstream children can use it. In conversations with the United Synagogue who commissioned this new version for their shuls – synagogues – and schools, we talked about how wonderful it would be if all young children started with this siddur. That way, as the majority grow up and no longer need it, they will have received their first education in an inclusive way that supports them to be more thoughtful children and adults.

For those with learning needs, it is the first time they will have a dedicated prayer book that they can access and engage with. And, as a friend said to me, “What about all the people who come to shul sporadically, cannot read Hebrew and have no clue what is being said?” – perhaps they too could dip into Siddur Lakol and find that a service begins to hold more meaning for them too.

Prayer provides routine and structure. It is personal, it can be meditative and reflective, it can be joyful and uplifting and it can be comforting. It would be wonderful if Siddur Lakol might inspire other faith-based communities to think about their own prayer books and resources to be more inclusive to all.

My hope is that the pupils at Gesher treasure their siddur the same way I did mine and that all of their prayers be listened to and answered.

The SEND system needs urgent investment, now more than ever

By Ali Durban13th July 2022

By Ali Durban, Co-Founder Gesher School.

The system is failing on every measure. We desperately need an education reset now more than ever.

These were the findings of the Times Education Commission from 15 June, which brought together business leaders and educators to discuss the reforms needed to create a system fit for the 21st century. The report’s conclusions reached across the education sector and, for me, resonated with my experience of the current SEND system.

One of my children is differently-able and as a family, me, my husband and all my children have experienced huge amounts of pain navigating the SEND system, which isn’t designed to support you, even though it pretends it is. It was a very difficult and all-consuming time. You are constantly fighting, and the emotion of navigating the education system is horrific. I call them my dark years.

Our journey is multiplied across thousands of schools and families.

Poorly resourced and inefficient there is a huge scarcity of high-quality provision in the UK. This means that children with SEND typically exist in – and fall through – the cracks of an education system which should be nurturing, fostering and developing them. Instead it is doing deep and sometimes irreparable damage to them.

These experiences were the catalyst for the creation of Gesher – my contribution to fixing a system which is complicated and complex and, simply put, is in crisis.

Over the last couple of years I have received countless calls from desperate parents of children with SEND, who have somehow managed to get my phone number. Each call is a different story full of immense pain. A child aged six on antidepressants and self-harming, a mother counting the days since the last day her child tried to take their life – 111 days today. A child who can’t leave their bedroom because of crippling anxiety and OCD. Another child being home-schooled because of a deep rooted school trauma. The calls never stop coming.

‘Deeply concerning’ proposals

When the Government finally released a long-awaited Green Paper on SEND with the promise of ‘access to an equal and excellent education, for each and every child and young person with SEND’, there was a sense of hope for system transformation and the possibility of something better for thousands of invisible children and young people.
However the wording in the Green Paper is ambiguous and highly misleading. Language such as national standards, mediation and accountability conjure up images of a robust system with a framework designed to place the child and their needs at the centre of the system.

There are a number of deeply concerning proposals in the paper which, if legislated, would overhaul the 2014 Children and Families Act. It will affect the rights and entitlements of children and young people to access special educational provision and make it even more difficult for parents and carers to have their children’s needs identified and access to specialist provision being specified and quantified. This is to reduce cost and spend rather than meeting the needs and removing barriers to learning for some of the most vulnerable children in our society. The outcomes in life of children with SEND are significantly poorer than those of their peers. And when picked up later in life the loss of earnings and cost of care to the system is £32billion annually. More than cancer, strokes and heart disease combined. And this is just for Autism alone.

The SEND system needs urgent investment now more than ever.

The ÂŁ70million promise from the government that sits alongside the green paper is highly misleading. It is to implement the proposed system changes and not for frontline services. To put it into perspective it is one-eighth of the funding provided to implement the 2014 SEND reforms. Enquiry after enquiry has found that these reforms failed because they were poorly implemented due to a lack of funding.

Shaping the SEND provision we want and need

We have long-awaited the chance to shape the SEND provision we want and need, and rather than rewriting legislation, we need to focus on the unmet needs of thousands of children and young people:

Some of my key recommendations would be:

  • No additional mediation process as part of the EHCP process.
  • An independent panel that holds Local Authorities to account.
  • A formal review of EHCP time-scales.
  • No national list of schools, but instead a continued and expanded local offer that is not based on cost or an agreement to Section 41. But quality and successful outcomes for Children and Young People.
  • An amendment of legislation to the Children and Families Act so that SEND support is mandatory.
  • An accountability framework that sits alongside, and supports, the 2014 Children and Families Act.
  • A national standard for statutory assessments.
  • Greater allocation of funding for frontline services.

We should not be mediating on the rights of children and young people.

According to Children and Families Minister MP Will Quince there have only been several hundred responses to the Green Paper to date.

The consultation is open until 22 July.

If you need to check your thinking to respond Special Needs Jungle have prepared some resources and answers.

Please be bold and amplify your voice on behalf of the unmet needs of those who often remain invisible and marginalised by the system.

SEND Green Paper Round Table

9th July 2022Ali Durban

The SEND Green Paper was commissioned in November 2019 and stemmed from the SEND review, which examined why the legislation in the Children and Families Act in the 2014 hasn’t worked as it was intended it to.

There was not enough funding in the system to deliver what was set out and as a result too many children and young people are not receiving the support they should.

Problems with the SEND Green paper

Rather than prioritising the unmet needs of thousands of children and young people, the Green Paper is trying to reduce cost and the number of tribunals by making it even harder to for families and carers to access support.

The priorities in the Green Paper are completely wrong and there seems to be a real disconnect between the proposal in the paper versus the realities of a hugely challenging and complex system that families and carers face trying to access support and provision for their child.

Why we recorded a round table

We need as many people as possible to be aware of the proposed changes and respond. We held a round table to discuss the issues, and we hope you will find it useful when formulating your own responses.

We’ve divided the recording up by topic: introduction to the green paper, national standards, the ‘list of schools’, mandatory mediation, accountability and how to respond.

Taking part were

  • Adam Friel – Partner and Head of Education Geldards Law
  • Salise Dourmash – Senior Asscociate, Geldards Law
  • Dr Carrie Grant, MBE, Broadcaster, Vocal and Leadership Coach and Campaigner
  • Ali Durban, Co-Founder Gesher School
  • Charlotte Hadfield, Barrister, Head of Education, 3PB

Introduction

Who we are and why the green paper has come out.

National Standards

The proposal to create a standard that everyone needs to fit into to access support and provision.

List of Schools

The government wants to try have list of select schools that parents will be forced to choose from for their child.

Mandatory Mediation

The proposal for a legal requirement to go through mediation when trying to secure an EHCP.

Accountability

Local authorities often behave unlawfully – who will hold them to account in these new proposals?

How to respond

The language in the questionnaire is intimidating and inaccessible – our thoughts on how best to respond.

Gesher’s Big Build

26th April 2022Ali Durban

In July 2021 we embarked upon our most ambitious fundraising exercise to date – Gesher’s Big Build.

Having found a new site to relocate and expand our school, we spent 8 months with architects and planners to assess the work needed to transform a one form entry, mainstream primary school into an all through school for SEN pupils. We will need to spend ÂŁ6.5m in total over a number of years to modernise, update and adapt the building. The infrastructure and use of spaces are critical as they reflect our approach to education. Our fund raiser in July was the first phase of this project allowing us to do the first tranche of work. It was a remarkable weekend and we felt truly enveloped by the support and generosity shown towards the campaign from across the community and beyond. Over 24 hours we raised a staggering ÂŁ2.2m. Thank you to all who took part, including the charity extra team, our Big Build Team, the Gesher students and of course all of our wonderful donors.

Jane from Cube Design on the process of building Gesher.

cube_design have been delighted to assist Gesher School with the development of their facilities at Canon Lane, Pinner. The School is an inspiration to any designer.

 

As a major player in the educational market, we have been excited to develop the design principles for the school.

An existing building, completed in the 1990s, has provided an excellent facility and baseline from which we have been able to develop our pallet and design aspirations for the school.

 

 

The creation of spaces, which are large enough for teaching theory, practical; the forthcoming maker spaces and the occupational therapy areas will be exemplary in terms of their design and dealing with the key issues of the pupilsʌ needs and pedagogical links.

The maker space will offer a unique opportunity to combine practical, theoretical and day-to-day citizenship and communication required to develop the young pupils at the school.

The spaces have been carefully designed to provide the linkages, year group bases, direct links to the externalspaces for play and interaction, all within a very secure and safe environment.

The main hall provides an immense facility for the children in terms of gymnastics, games and drama. It also provides a base for the dining facilities and is an ideal large space for full school assembly.

The external spaces are amazing! The facilities provide external covered play, to exist in three locations, themed areas and covered canopies linking out directly from spaces including the soft play and occupational therapy. These provide each pupil with the opportunity to experience inside outside space and recreation.

This project has offered an immense opportunity to provide, for the pupils, a light and airy environment. As part of the refurbishment, we have incorporated full refurbishment of the existing services, ensuring that health and safety priorities, i.e. avoiding contact with radiators, are met and providing natural ventilation throughout to ensure the best environment for the pupils. This has also been incorporated as part of the lighting design.

The spaces are large, generally 60sqm as a minimum, naturally ventilated with amazing daylighting facilities; and with the development of the team in terms of specialist FF&E, provide areas for quiet, therapy, academic and practical teaching.

We have also spent a significant amount of time considering the acoustics and the inclusion wherever possible, of acoustic panels to ensure that the right environment and reverberation is provided within the spaces.

An existing interior design has also been developed with our team.

cube_design is extremely proud to be associated with the Gesher School.

 

The Gesher Way

25th April 2022Ali Durban

Ali and Sarah were asked to define what Gesher means to them — what is the Gesher way? HereÊŒs what they had to say…

Ali:

Gesher has a number of different elements that make it truly unique. And whilst it they are all critical in the development and the outcomes of our students, it is the people in the school, around the school and behind the school that make it unique.

Collectively they are part of a relational community who are working towards a greater good and purpose; whose unconditional care and persistent commitment to our students that has enabled the school to flourish.

They form the character, culture, and heartbeat of the school. One of relational warmth, care, and compassion, where every voice is heard and every voice matters.  A commitment to being bold and brave, with a relentless pursuit of ensuring equity and opportunity. And where all children and young people are celebrated for who they are and the work they do.

 

This is the Gesher way.

 

Sarah:

Rabbi Sacks zÊŒl said

“The world our children will inherit tomorrow is born in the schools

we build today”.

The word ʻwayʌ has two meanings. It can mean ʻa method or a style of doing thingsʌ or it can be ʻthe pathway, track to travelʌ. And those two meanings perfectly encompass Gesher. The word Gesher means bridge. We aim for every one of our students to successfully step onto their bridge, ʻtheir pathʌ, walk across it and embrace all the opportunities the world has to offer. But to do that successfully takes a team of support.

The Gesher Way encompasses ambition, building relationships, having compassion and fundamentally – being collaborative.

We have sought to create a community of young people, parents, educators, therapists, exemplary schools, experts in SEND and autism, volunteers, philanthropists and foundations, future employers and faith-based organisations; all with a voice, all with a purpose and a part to play in the development of Gesher.