Alternative Provision
How Alternative Provision is arranged in Buckinghamshire
Commissioners within the Council arrange and monitor Alternative Provision. They work alongside other service areas in Children’s Services, including:
- The SEND Team
- Education Entitlement Team
- Admissions
- The Virtual School
These teams work together to commission safe provision, to support children and young people who need alternative or specialist education.
Regular reviews and contract monitoring take place. This is to ensure the Alternative Provider is delivering in accordance with commissioned services. They will also check the attendance and progress of pupils. This is in addition to the regular monitoring that referring schools are required to do.
Current Alternative Provision commissioned by the Council includes:
Bucks Primary PRU supports primary-aged pupils who are excluded or at risk of exclusion. They operate from 3 sites within the County, providing outreach support for pupils and teachers as well as in-school support and placements. They also provide in-house placements for pupils who are excluded.
Aspire is an alternative provision school (academy) and is commissioned to:
- provide a secondary Pupil Referral Unit (PRU) for those pupils who have been excluded, those excluded and are moving into Buckinghamshire
- there is also a site that provides full-time, permanent placements for pupils with Social Emotional and Mental Health Support (SEMH)
- provide outreach support to pupils at risk of exclusion in their home school or provide a placement in the event of permanent exclusion
- other support and provision to pupils who have a Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) referral
- provide outreach service to pupils in their home school
Bespoke provision for pupils with SEND provides tailored packages of support to meet the individual needs of a child or young person. There is a wide range of such alternative providers, which tend to be small organisations and usually unregistered, and cater for pupils with an Educational Health and Care (EHC) Plan.
The Council carry out a series of checks as part of the due diligence process to ensure that such provision is appropriate, safe and meets the required standards, particularly if the provider is unregistered. This process must be carried out before any unregistered provider is used as an alternative education provider for any pupil with an Educational Health and Care (EHC) Plan.
Buckinghamshire Council provided home tuition and hospital teaching services for pupils who are unable to attend school due to medical needs. This provision is delivered by an in-house council team within the SEND Service.