Special Educational Needs in Wales

The Welsh language

The Welsh and English languages must be treated on the basis of equality in the provision of services. The SEN Code of Practice for Wales makes it clear that in the context of special educational needs, the individual LEA Welsh Language Schemes should ensure that their services, in so far as it is appropriate in the circumstances and reasonably practicable, are delivered in Welsh and/or English according to the needs and wishes of the pupil and the parents.

It is important to identify the language of the home at the earliest stage in the process of dealing with a child with SEN. The parental preference for Welsh medium or English medium educational support provision must be taken into consideration. When assessing a child's communication skills, materials in the preferred language of either English or Welsh should be made available whenever possible.

A key principle when communicating with parents is to provide information and advice in the language preferred by parents.

Speech and Language Therapy and educational services must also fulfil the requirements of the Welsh Language Act 1993 for pupils/students over 16 years of age.

Wales has its own Special Educational Needs Code of Practice. The National Assembly approved this in November 2001 and LEAs have been required to have regard to it from April 2002. You can download it from the National Assembly website.

The SEN Tribunal

There is a separate SEN Tribunal for Wales. Parents whose children have special educational needs can appeal to SENTW against decisions made by Welsh Local Authorities (LAs) about their children's education. More information about the tribunal can be found here:  http://wales.gov.uk/sentwsub/home