Funding for Additional Support Needs
We want to offer the right help at the right time to all our children and young people to help them learn, grow and reach their potential. To help, we’re changing the way we fund support for children with additional support needs. Exceptional needs means needs which are complex and enduring. This differs from predictable needs which are more prevalent in school communities.
Funding for exceptional and predictable needs will be amalgamated. Funding to meet needs will now also be managed by schools based on a factors giving rise to additional support needs in each school’s population.
Instead of applying to a panel within the council, decisions about funding support for exceptional needs will be made by the Head Teacher and their teams who know your child best. This approach will allow them to work with you to be more creative and flexible in the way they meet your child’s needs, recognising that every child is different and there is no uniform approach. It will reduce bureaucracy for families and better reflect the variety of needs of children and young people in each East Lothian school.
These changes apply to our mainstream schools only.
The new approach will come into effect in August 2025 for the start of the school year. Until then, schools will continue to submit Child’s Plans to a panel for consideration of exceptional needs funding.
Find out about the changes and ongoing work to introduce them.