DfE looking at incentivising school collaboration to cut exclusions
The minister responsible for SEND and disadvantaged children has said he wants to explore ways to encourage schools to work together to not exclude pupils.
Nadhim Zahawi was speaking at a meeting on reducing exclusions and closing the gap for children with SEND at the Conservative Party Conference in Birmingham.
He raised the issue of off-rolling pupils, where parents are encouraged to remove their children from the school roll to avoid a formal exclusion.
He said: “I want to be crystal clear that such activity is illegal, unethical and will not be tolerated.
“I have already said that an excluded child is clearly at a severe disadvantage compared to their non-excluded peers.
“Arguably, an excluded pupil with a special educational need is at an even greater disadvantage, not only does an excluded pupil with SEN lose what their non-SEN counterparts would lose, but they also lose any additional SEN support their school provides them.”
Read the full article in Tes.