Woman's Hour - Children with special educational needs and disabilities at academy schools, Kim Cypher, Choreographer Lucy Hind

Episode Date: November 28, 2024

Academy schools were one of the issues that listeners raised during, and since, Woman’s Hour’s special programme investigating the SEND system for children with special education needs and disabilities. We hear the voices of two mums who say their children were let down by their Academy schools for allegedly failing to support their children's SEND needs and Anita Rani discusses SEND support in Academies with Leora Cruddas, CEO of the Confederation of School Trusts which represents more than ¾ of all Academies.Choreographer and intimacy director Lucy Hind has worked on major productions including Girl From the North Country, Oliver, My Fair Lady, Secret Life of Bees and more recently Groundhog Day. Her latest project Spend Spend Spend has just opened at the Royal Exchange theatre in Manchester and is the story of the infamous Viv Nicholson who in the 1960’s won today’s equivalent of a few million pounds and went on to spend it all on very public lavish spending-sprees. Lucy explains to Anita why being an intimacy director is an integral part of being a choreographer.Kim Cypher is a saxophonist, composer, vocalist and a regular performer on the London and UK jazz circuit including sold our performances on the main stage at Ronnie Scott's Jazz Club. She’s just launched her third album Catching Moments and Kim and her band join Anita in the Woman's Hour studio.Presenter: Anita Rani Producer: Laura Northedge

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. I'm Natalia Melman-Petrozzella, and from the BBC, this is Extreme Peak Danger. The most beautiful mountain in the world. If you die on the mountain, you stay on the mountain. This is the story of what happened when 11 climbers died on one of the world's deadliest mountains, K2, and of the risks we'll take to feel truly alive. If I tell all the details, you won't believe it anymore. Extreme, peak danger. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.

BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, I'm Anita Rani and welcome to Woman's Hour from BBC Radio 4. Just to say that for rights reasons, the music in the original radio broadcast has been removed for this podcast. Good morning and welcome to the programme. Now, when we did our special programme on SEND, investigating the special educational needs and disability system, we got a huge response from you. There were so many questions around this subject. One thing that came out of our audience on that day when we recorded in the radio theatre was someone shouting out loud as they listened to the Education Minister, Catherine McKinnell. It was around the issue of academies. Have a listen.

Everyone has a responsibility for the children in their area and have a duty to work together to make sure that every child gets the best start in life and every child gets that chance at their education, which we want to see. Come in there, Minister. What did I miss there? A duty to cooperate. Not if they're at an academy.

There you go. So this morning we will be looking into academies and send. 79% of secondary schools and 43% of primary schools in England are academies. A little bit of information for you there. As usual, we would like to hear your thoughts and experiences and any questions you may have. Get in touch in the usual way. The text number is 84844. You can email me by going to our website.

You can contact us on our social media. It's at BBC Woman's Hour or WhatsApp or even Voice Note if you like. It's 03700 100 444. Also on the programme this morning, Lucy Hind, the choreographer turned intimacy director and music. From Kim Cipher, music teacher turned jazz saxophonist. That text number once again, 84844. But first, a new investigation has been launched by the Metropolitan Police in connection with the allegations of sexual offences by Mohammed Al-Fayyad. The force is investigating more than five people who may have assisted him.

The commander in charge, Steve Clayman, says police will look at what roles individuals may have played in facilitating or enabling his offending and what opportunities they had to protect victims from his horrendous abuse. Since the case first came to light, more than 90 new victims have come forward. I'll be talking in a moment to Emma Jones,

a solicitor representing some of the women. But first, I would like to hear from Dame Jasvinder Sanghera, a prominent human rights campaigner and the founder of the charity Karma Nirvana, which helps honour-based abuse and who has recently been appointed as independent survivor advocate for the women coming forward. Good morning Dame Jess Finder, welcome to Woman's Hour. I'm going to start by just finding out what this what your role actually entails as independent advocate for the survivors. Good morning Anita. Yes so my role is important to be clear is independent from the claims process that's the first thing to say.

The role is independent. I do not have a duty or obligation, neither will I, report back to Harrods, albeit I will report back to Harrods if I feel there is a need to improve processes or, you know, to advocate what victims and survivors are saying needs changing. So from my perspective, it is additional to the claims process. Victims and survivors need to know that they now have an independent voice. I'm here to ensure that they have access to support. Let's be clear here, Harrods have accepted vicarious liability. Every survivor who is eligible for the scheme has access to a therapeutic support, an independent lawyer. They also have access to me in terms of having conversations.

I've started my engagement already. Next week, we'll be speaking to people. So I think the important thing here is, Anita, you know, this is not just about the compensation. Survivors, and I speak from experience, also want to see change. They also want to ensure that any processes that are developed for this purpose do not cause further harm. What I see fundamental to my role is to ensure whatever anybody does in relation to engagement with victims and survivors, that it is trauma informed. And you say you don't have to report back to Harrods, but you are employed by them.

Absolutely. I am employed by them, you know, just as you are employed by the BBC. You know, one has to be employed. But the point here is those that know me know my track record in terms of standing up for and speaking on behalf of victims and survivors. You say 290 women have come forward already. Do you expect that number to increase? 290 are in the process. I already said I do expect the number to increase. And that is because in my

experience, victims and survivors out there have yet to report. This is a reported area. It takes immense effort to report abuse. So some people will be sitting on their reporting and mindful of the fact that survivors out there, victims out there may be triggered by what is happening here, you know, and listening to this. So it's important that, you know, they know they have an independent option to be able to access somebody to speak through the process, to hear what their options are and what their choices are. So here's the question that's been going around this morning with what's come to light with these five people who are being investigated.

How probable is it, Jasminder, that this alleged abuse could have been carried out without anyone else knowing? Well, I don't think that is probable at all because the bottom line is that even if you look at Jimmy Savile and you look at other abuses in this area where individuals facilitate the abuse, you know, it happens because people look the other way or people knew it was happening but didn't feel able to report. Or then you have those like the Met Police were investigating that actually facilitated the abuse in relation to access to these vulnerable young women. So, you know, people would have known. I want to be mindful of the fact that there will

be people out there who probably did know and are feeling very unsure and were unsure about reporting. You know, I'm talking about it could be a shop assistant, it could be a neighbour, it could be anybody. It's really difficult to report and be a bystander, but there's a distinguishing thing here. Those who facilitated it need to be held to account because they played an active role in enabling this to happen. Are there patterns of behaviour that you might see that perpetrators might employ to make others complicit in their crime? Say that again, sorry. Patterns of behaviour. That? That the perpetrators, how do you convince people to be complicit?

Is it subtle? Is it controlled? Is it about people turning a blind eye through fear? I think the first thing to note is that these individuals will identify people who are vulnerable. That would be the first thing. Or, you know, if we look at, you know, to get a job in Harrods was a big deal, you know, to get experience, etc. You know, there's an excitement there. And, you know, using things like, you know, their job prospects, using the fact that they could be promoted, using the fact that these individuals were made to feel a part of an organisation only to then use that to exploit them. So, you know, you know, these are strong women, we were talking about these are strong women, you know, these are not weak women. But the fact is that, you know,

their positions were used. and that's what the point I'm making here but then equally you know what I'm already identifying is you know the Met Police make reference to the youngest victim being 13 now we're talking about children children are vulnerable you know so identifying young people identifying people from the deaf community, for example, I've heard that too. So, you know, yes, there are patterns of behaviours, but equally, they would have been targeting people that this man would have wanted to access. Emma, I'm going to bring you in because you've been speaking to some of the women affected. What are they telling you that they need right now? Good morning, Anita. telling you that they need right now good morning anita um what the survivors need is the survivors

that i've spoken with need to have power returned to them basically in order for the women to feel a sense of justice is to have that power returned because these are women who have been ignored for so long a number of women have reported the abuse to the police. They've been let down by the police, by the GMC, by the CPS. They suffered this horrendous abuse over decades and have felt powerless for all this time. So what do these women need? These women need the power to be returned to them.

We know when some women did come forward, nothing happened. Some of those investigations were carried out post the Saville inquiry in 2014. Why do you think, Emma, another powerful man was able to behave like this after what we learned from Saville? I think because men like this haven't really been fully investigated i know that post savel there was a quite a specific inquiry looking into the nhs trust but it wasn't a wide-ranging inquiry and so there hasn't been that wide-ranging inquiry public inquiry so that a chairperson can compel witnesses to come forward, compel documents, to look at systems across the board, to look at the GMC, to look at doctors, to look at the police, to look at Harrods, to look at various agencies that might have helped to place women in Harrods.

We need a full and thorough public inquiry to have a real fact-finding mission so that accountability can be determined and the most important thing lessons can be learned recommendations made that then the government will need to implement to try to ensure that something like this doesn't happen again as you say we've seen it with savile we've seen it with so many uh powerful men who also are able to use the law, who are able to threaten defamation. And we hear about slaps and NDAs. All of those things need to be looked into. So, yeah, let's get into that a bit more on a more granular level. So you're saying, you know, empower the power to be able to use what they have at their disposal.

But, you know, what's about people turning a blind eye? These are huge institutions with lots of people working within them. You know, moving away from the case a little bit, just trying to understand the tactics employed, if you like. By the people within Harrods? No, just within a system to be able to, by the perpetrator, to be able to get away with it? Of course. Well, I think, as we know, the police are looking into five people who might have been complicit.

Yeah. And when you, they're looking at being complicit, facilitating, but also failing to protect women so it's having this group of people having systems in place who are able to feed into a mechanism that will allow a perpetrator to carry out this abuse for for so many years and i think yes turning a blind eye as just uh to finder said that there might have been people working at harrods that were too afraid to come forward that we've heard anecdotal evidence about when um alfired was was going to do a walk through harrods that senior or slightly older female staff would send the younger girls off to the stock group to do a stock take so that they weren't on the floor now if you're an employee in a power in a firm that's run by a very, very powerful, very rich man, it's going to be really difficult to come forward.

So what people were doing, I think as far as they were able to, were doing things like sending people to the stockroom or suggesting they go out and got coffee or something, as much as they could to try to protect but for the employees working within harrods it must have been very very difficult when at the top of that chain was a man who was so rich so powerful seemed to have friends everywhere and seemed to be able to evade any form of prosecution, even though reports have been made to the CPS, sorry, to the police that had gone to the CPS on a number of occasions, two or three occasions.

Back to the victims and the women at the heart of this, Jasvinder. Your sessions with the women are starting next week, but I know you've already spoken to a couple of them. What are they telling you? Well, the anxiety you know the experiences of um shame and it's misplaced shame let me be clear about that um you know the having to relive this experience and you know i'm hoping the process does not is not one where they're having to retell their stories because that in itself is painful. I do want to make a point towards what Emma's just said, if I may. Harers are very clear, there will

be no NDAs. There is not an expectation for there to be NDAs. That's important, okay? No non-disclosure agreements. And also, I agree with you, Emma, the survivors need power returned to them. You know, their voice is significant to change. With every survivor that I engage with, I will be asking them what they need in this process and what does change look like for you. Equally, I want to ensure that they have a support network because I'm not clear about a support network in terms of the peer network or a support group. These things need to be identified. If we are going to be returning power to them, we need to start with them to understand what does that look like. And the last thing I will say is we have a whistleblowing culture. We need to ensure

we are, every institution is creating a whistleblowing culture that protects those who whistleblow. Organisations need to do that and that will stop the bystanders standing by. They will feel protected when they raise their heads. And you're keen to speak to all victims of all fires abuse, even if they didn't work at Harrods. How can women get in touch with you? Absolutely. So NPL Legal are the legal firm that are developing the compensation scheme process.

You can go to their website. There's an email on there. It's contact at survivoradvocate.co.uk. I just want to impress upon you that all conversations with myself are confidential. And Emma, the police say the investigation is about giving survivors a voice and they're committed to seeking justice. Does that reassure you or the women you're representing? Unfortunately, no. The police could have been committed to giving women a voice a number of years ago. I think the women that we've spoken to need more than that.

And just going back to a point that's been raised before, in order to help the women, the survivor network, one of the other incredibly beneficial things that comes out of a public inquiry, and I know this from experience through working on infected blood, is the cathartic process that survivors can go through. And so many people who had been infected, infected blood, thought they were alone,

thought this has only happened to me. And yet through that process, they came together. They were able to share their stories, share their experiences and form this really strong common bond, knowing that they were pushing and pushing and pushing and hopefully going to make changes to the system. Jasvinder Sanghera and Emma, thank you so much for speaking to me about this this morning. That was Dame Jasvinder Sanghera

and Emma Jones, who's a solicitor representing some of the women. And I must add that if you have been affected by anything you've heard, you can find links for support on the BBC Action Line website.

And the Metropolitan Police have said in a statement, we are aware that past events may have impacted the public's trust and confidence in our approach and we're determined to rebuild that trust by addressing these allegations with integrity and thoroughness. 84844 is the number to text. Now, Lucy Hind may not be a familiar name to many of you, but if you are a theatre fan, you'll have undoubtedly heard of some of the productions she's worked on. Girl from the North Country, Oliver, My Fair Lady, Secret Life of Bees

and more recently Groundhog Day. Lucy is a choreographer and in the last few years also an intimacy director. Her current project has just opened at the Royal Exchange Theatre in Manchester. Spend, Spend, Spend is the story of Viv Nicholson, who went on a very public, lavish spending spree, splashing out on furs, cars, champagne and parties until it all came crashing down around having won the football pools in the 1960s. Some of you may remember the story. Today's equivalent, she won around today's equivalent a few million pounds. Lucy joins me now from Manchester. Welcome to Woman's Hour. Lovely to chat. Thanks for having me. Absolutely our pleasure. Let's start by, I didn't know about Viv Nicholson. There's like a bit of a generational divide in the office where loads of people at Woman's Hour are like,

oh my God, Viv Nicholson. So tell us a bit about a working class Yorkshire lass and quite a character by all accounts. Yeah, really an extraordinary woman. It came from kind of really humble roots in castle fed and um she gets married really young she's sort of 17 gets pregnant when she's 16 and and has this real sense that she wants to break them break the expectations of what her life is set up for She's a really kind of working class mining community. And when in the 60s, she wins this enormous amount of money. And we really see her leaning into the possibility that this can give her for a very different kind of life. And she also really intrigued the general public at her first press conference when she won the money by saying she

was just going to spend it all and then people really followed her through her journey in that and she did fulfill that promise uh her and her husband keith went on to spend it all what did they spend it on i mean everything from a big fancy house many many cars they went on many holidays i think it's everything that we think god if I ever won the lottery what would I spend it on those dreams and then we get really sensible and we think actually what we would do and they didn't do that and I think that really fascinated people especially at the time in the 60s in the community they came from and as a woman having that ambition to want to change yeah what was expected of her. And why did the British public get so invested in her story?

What impact did it have on our psyche? I think there is a fascination of what we would want to do with it. I also think it's one of two things. I think, like I said, as a woman, I think she, there was an expectation of how minors' wives, daughters, mothers should behave, and she just didn't do that. And then I also think we are intrigued by what that means for our own choices. So we have these rules by which we live that makes us good and sensible.

And then we see someone doing the opposite. And either we are inspired by that or we resent it a little bit. We resent it because there's we yeah we resent it because there's something in us that would want to do the same right yeah that's the resentment and also how how dare she as a woman a working class yorkshire woman have a great time with a load of money is there something of that going on exactly and then when it falls and and then we go ah see told you so we're right we're right it's don't take any risks oh we're awful aren't we um so what's your role on this brilliant production then spend spend spend so i've had a brilliant time i'm the

choreographer so i get to do all the dance moves and it's such a big bright brilliant bright christmas show you get to put all your favorite moves in at christmas and then i've also been the intimacy director on the show yes this is interesting so tell us what that role is what does it mean we've talked about intimacy director on the show. Yes, this is interesting. So tell us what that role is. What does it mean? We've talked about intimacy director on the programme before, but specifically, not specifically around theatre. What have you been doing? It's slightly different to a TV and film role. I think that's called an intimacy coordinator. In theatre, it's very much about making sure that the actors feel like they don't have to take responsibility for the intimacy. So they don't have to take responsibility for the intimacy.

So they don't have to be choreographing it themselves. They don't have to bring their own personal experience because traditionally that's kind of what we've done with this area. It's a very new role. And I like to think of it like it's fight directing or choreography. Like we'd never say to an actor, oh, you know what it's like to be in a pub fight. Why don't you guys just get on with it? And we kind of do that with intimacy. So it's my role to go in and set up a consent-based room. So it's really basic. We're just asking each other before we do things. We're getting permission. We're understanding each other's boundaries. I then choreograph those moves like it is a dance. We then have a document that makes sure it's set so if it ever changes if anybody starts to feel

like that's shifting um we can come back to that document and then if a cover or an understudy ever goes on they have a set of blocking and moves that they can adhere to as well and are the actors always willing to be part of it i presume i about, you know, people who have been doing this for, you know, decades and know, have an instinct and have been in the theatre. Like, how are people adapting to this new way of doing things? It's really mixed. I mean, generally, it's really positive. I think anything that helps an actor feel like they can do their job well, that they're comfortable, that they're in an environment that they're safe but I think there is sometimes an implied tone that maybe the room isn't safe if I'm there and I'm there to kind of police their behavior and I think that makes them afraid they're going to get it wrong I think some

people may fear that I will take away their spontaneity and their chemistry but for me it's really about creating a space rather than saying here are a list of no's of things that you can't do it's about checking in with everybody and going actually here's a playground of yeses that this is some boundaries on which we can explore and also it's work it's a job you want to feel like there are some ways to de-roll and leave your character behind and that's really hard when you're really intimate with your colleague every day how do you navigate all those personalities how do you go in and do that job you know in the first bit of my training the first thing you do is you learn your own boundaries and you learn how to say no and how to say yes in a way that isn't about shutting things

down and I think that was the best part of my training so being able to advocate for actors being able to hear people's needs and their fears and then also go actually we're here to to create a really positive environment rather than one that is about getting in trouble but yeah you know especially I mean I'm I'm in my 40s so I think I'd find this harder if I was a lot younger because I I can in and have some experience and work with lots of generations of actors. I usually find that if there is any kickback, well, not kickback, but hesitancy or fear, usually at the end of the process, a lot of those actors will come to me and say, do you know what? I'm so grateful for this. I'm going to tell you a horror story of something that happened to me in my career. And I hear a lot of those stories of people go, oh, if I'd had this when I was younger, I feel like I'd have better mental health or I'd have

a better approach to my work. Yeah. How interesting. So people have just, if you know no different, you just go along with how it's always been done. Yeah. I'm wondering about that overlap between being a choreographer and being an intimacy director, because your job is to show people how to move their bodies and often, you know, together in very, very close proximity. Yeah. Did it feel like a natural step for you? It does. It is a natural step. And actually, my intimacy directing has informed my choreography quite a bit as well. So before, especially in choreography and in dance you you can just say i'll just show you let me just show you this and and in intimacy directing we don't do that because

i have my own boundaries and i don't want to cross that line with a colleague as well so you have to describe everything so it's changed the way i work in that sense so you as a choreographer you can't just take another trained dancer and yes Yes, yeah, you can in choreography, but I'd probably ask first. Right, yeah. So you can't do that in intimacy, but you can do it in choreography. But I feel like that's crossed over and I'd go, hey, do you mind if I dance with you here? Can I cut in here?

And also about going, is there anything that you would like to offer as something that you don't want to do? Or if you have any previous injuries those those crossovers are really useful I mean it's so obvious it's about just checking in but as an industry we've taught our actors to just say yes to everything and say right you know it's your job just to get on with it and we just don't need to do that we're creative people we can take account of take into account everybody's needs and make something that's really invest in the longevity of our actors and what about dancers yeah I mean again there is actually intermediate directing is slowly eking into the dance world again dancers are are told to get on with it whether they're in pain or

not traditionally and I used to be a dancer as well so and I think especially in terms of the boundaries of their body yeah you you have to just be used to being grabbed anywhere and everywhere in order to do those lifts and connect with people. But again, I think it's just about asking. And also, it's about being able to say no. Because I think in a room with such strong levels of hierarchy, and because of the nature of our self-employment, you want to get another job, right? So saying no comes with a risk or even saying could we try something else comes with a risk. Because you become the difficult one or you don't want to do the job and someone else will just come and do it. Yeah, all of that.

Exactly. Especially if you're a woman, as we know. And so you kind of describe yourself more of as a movement director then? Yeah, so choreography, I would say, is more for my musicals work but I work in plays as well so I do scene changes and body coaching and anything that's connected to the movement language on stage sometimes I just get to help actors with their character work that also falls under the banner of movement so it's a little bit more than choreography. Well and you've had a lot of fun doing Spend Spend Spend. my goodness. It's such a joyful show. I have to tell you, before I say goodbye,

that when I saw that you worked on Girl from the North Country, every time I see anybody who works on this, I have to say, one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen. It made me weep. Thank you so much. It was so great. So well done on that. And thank you for talking to me this morning.

Spend, Spend, Spend continues at the Royal Exchange Theatre in Manchester until Saturday, the 11th of January next year. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. I'm Sarah Treleaven and for over a year I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered. There was somebody out there who's faking pregnancies. I started like warning everybody. Every doula that I know. It was fake. No pregnancy. And the deeper I dig, the more questions I unearth. How long has she been doing this? What does she have to gain from this? From CBC and the BBC World Service, The Con,

Caitlin's Baby. It's a long story, settle in. Available now. Now, the local government ombudsman is demanding greater powers so that it can consider complaints about admissions and exclusions in academy schools. In a report setting out its plans for the next three years, it says the current rules,

which only allow it to investigate local authority-maintained schools but not academies, are neither logical nor fair. The Ombudsman says parents have different levels of redress depending on which school their child attends. Well, in our special programme back in September, investigating the special educational needs and disabilities or SEND system, one thing that got some of our audience shouting out of their seats in the BBC Radio Theatre as they listened to the Education Minister, Catherine McK McKinnell was the issue of academies. One of the things we do want to reform and we're going to be

legislating for it is a change to the admission system and that's fundamental as part of what we want to achieve. We want to reform the curriculum, we want to reform the way schools cooperate together with their local authorities regardless of the nature of the school, and I know that's been raised, but everyone has a responsibility for the children in their area and have a duty to work together to make sure that every child gets the best start in life and every child gets that chance at their education, which we want to see.

Not if they're at an academy. That's right. What did I miss there? A duty to cooperate. Not if they're at an academy. That's what I'm saying. That's some of the. What did I miss there? The duty to cooperate. Not if they're at an academy. No, that's what I'm saying. That's some of the women's, our audience, making their voices heard back in September,

and we are here to amplify your voices. Since then, as promised, we've been continuing our investigations into the SEND system for children with special educational needs and disabilities. Today, we're looking at academies. After more of you contacted us, reporting negative experiences of academy schools for your children. Obviously many academies are excellent with brilliant teachers and SEND staff resulting in children and families who are exceptionally happy with the support they get if they have extra needs. But that's not everyone's experience so we decided to find out what's going on. Joining me to discuss this and to explore how academies fit into the educational landscape is Leora Crudas, the CEO of the Confederation of School

Trusts. Leora has been an English teacher, a SEND advisor and also the Director of Education at two London local authorities. She's also advised successive governments and sits on several Department for Education advisory bodies. So Leora, you're perfectly placed to talk to us this morning. Welcome to Woman's Hour. Good morning, Anita. Good morning. We're getting lots of people messaging in already, and there's lots to get through,

but let's start with setting out some facts. What is an academy school? So, Anita, an academy school is a charitable organisation that runs a school or indeed a group of schools. So it's the charitable organisation rather than the local authority that runs the school. Now that does not mean that the school doesn't work in its local authority. It of course does. All schools are rooted in their community. So that's an important thing to say.

Another important thing to say is that all academy schools are state schools. So they're funded by the state in the same way that local authority schools are funded by the state. They're inspected by Ofsted in the same way. They have the same rules around admissions, for example. They must do the same tests and exams. So most academy schools work together in groups of schools called multi-academy trusts. And you gave some statistics at the beginning of Women's Hour talking about the number of secondary schools. That's about four in five secondary schools are academies and around 43% of primary schools are academies. I should also say around 47% of special schools are academies and most academies, most academy trusts are actually quite small so they're

very geographically located and really have a strong sense of being located in their communities working closely with local authority schools and with the local authority. So how do they differ then? What's the point of difference between them and a local authority school, which is also known as a maintained school? A maintained school, yes. So the key difference is that the local authority

does not maintain academy schools. The body that's responsible for academy schools is the Academy Trust, which, as I've said, is a charitable organisation. So can academies turn away children with SEND? No, they cannot. The admissions code applies to all types of state schools equally. They definitely cannot. It is also fair to say, I think, on this point that proportionately there are the same number of children with

special educational needs in academies as in local authority schools. Okay, Leora, thank you for the moment, but please stay with us. As I said, we've been hearing from parents who say their children with SEND have had bad experiences at academy schools. Many say they feel broken by the system. One woman ended her long email saying, thank you for allowing me to download 14 years of trauma since becoming a SEND family. Another shared a letter she recently

received from her academy saying it said it could no longer fund all SEND provision. And I quote, we are in the dreadful position of having to cease any unfunded provision because there is no more flexibility in our budget. I'm going to read out a message that's just come in this morning. I'm currently studying for a doctorate and my research focuses on how the academy agenda influences inclusion within schools. Young people with SEND are often an afterthought when these policies are rolled out. Seismic changes in the running of the education system need to consider the most vulnerable young people in the system and ensure that their inclusion is prioritised.

We've also been contacted by mums whose children have ended up having to leave their academy schools because they say their needs haven't been met. The words of these two mothers have been spoken by actors to protect the identity of them and their children. My son has SEND needs which weren't supported in his academy school. I sent him in year seven, believing in the school, the school being an outstanding school. But outstanding doesn't mean that SEND is outstanding and his needs were viewed through a lens of behavior and therefore

he could only ever be a problem. So the idea of send inclusivity is really a charade. There was just no communication between teachers, admin and myself. I was only trying to protect my son. And it just got worse and worse and worse until he ended up being a shell of a child. He is academic, but in the academy, intelligence is only viewed in a very narrow way. And unfortunately, it is leading to the mental collapse of multiple SEND children and their families. It was the most crazy situation. Just trying to get just the basic education for a child who should have been able to get an education. Both my children are in academies in primary and secondary school under the same multi-academy trust. The one in secondary is autistic and her needs are fairly minimal and being met within SEND support.

My youngest is a bit more complex. She's autistic and probably ADHD as well. My observation of being within an academy is that there's a very strong focus on the academic side of things. So what that has meant for both children is that if they are, have been, meeting academic expectations, they were deemed not to have SEND. And the schools, both primary and secondary, were very reluctant to acknowledge the SEND needs and put them on the register. And so it was very difficult, particularly with my youngest, to get any acknowledgement that she had SEND in the early stages, because we were seeing signs of anxiety at home had to send in the early stages because we were seeing signs of anxiety at home but not in the school setting. It was very stressful. It was very difficult to deal with that and not feel like it was our parenting. We were seeing something at home

that they weren't seeing in school and it took a very long time for that to be recognised. It was only recognised when there was a change of head teacher who came from a non-academy setting and I found that her understanding of SEND is much broader. She seemed to understand that it wasn't just about academics, that there was more to consider with the child's development and wider learning and education. So I think there's a strong argument to be had

that academies seem to have a more difficult time in understanding and accepting SEND beyond the academics. I don't think funding is the main consideration of why there could be a difference, because I think mainstream settings, which aren't academies, are also facing those funding difficulties. They're also under that pressure to make money go as far as possible. I think there is something to be said about the culture differences and perhaps

understanding of what SEND is and the definition of SEND and how to look at that. And I think that can be perpetuated particularly within a big corporation mindset that comes with multi-academy trusts. Even as evidence started to come in from other experts, including a community paediatrician, evidence which said this child's being overlooked because of her gender and, you know, possibly because of her age, that wasn't taken into consideration, again, because she was making progress academically. It felt like it was too little too late, and a year after being put on the SEND register, unfortunately, she was unable to cope and was no longer able to access school due to chronic stress after three years of trying to make the setting work. And no one's tried harder than the child. Now we find ourselves in

the position of having a child who's outside of school. She's still on roll but unable to attend and receiving some alternative provision. And we are having to consider other school settings which might be better suited. And we'll probably have to go via tribunal to make sure that her plan and the setting is the correct place so that she can thrive and get a good education. The best way to explain it is educational gaslighting. It was just weekly, constantly trying to solve a situation in a school that promotes itself as being inclusive. I would go as far to say I feel the school bullied my son and myself because he didn't fit the narrative and therefore neither did I. He's not good at all. We are still building him back as a person.

And what I found was the children that needed the most received the least. And it was heartbreaking. The experience of two of our listeners there. Well, we're still with Leora Crudas, the CEO of the Confederation of Schools Trust. Listening to the words of those mums, Leora, what do you make of their stories? So Anita, I'm really sad to hear about the experiences of those two mums and of course, their children. This is horrible. and we must build a better system together where children don't end up in those situations and parents don't end up in those situations.

So I really agree that our SEND system doesn't currently work well. But it doesn't work well for children in all types of schools. I don't think this is an issue for one type of school. It is an issue for all schools. And I'd like to say that in our recent survey, leaders in Academy Trust said that their number one priority in the system was ensuring inclusive education. So I think we need to work towards a system that is good for all of our children, for all of their parents, and for all of our schools.

So I think we're in this together. All our children need to feel like they belong in our state schools, regardless of structure. Yes, and I'm sure people do want to ensure that it's an inclusive system and you said that SEND, I asked you the question whether they can, academies can turn away children with SEND and you said absolutely not. So why are parents telling us that academies do turn their children away? So I think there's a complex answer to this. Around 62% of state-educated children in England are educated in academy schools. So that's a big proportion. That's the largest part of the school system in England is actually the academy system. So I think the strong likelihood is you are going to see proportionately more complaints

then from the academy sector than perhaps from the local authority sector. But as I've said, I honestly don't think that this is about one type of school structure. So what I'd like to focus on is this is a system that is in need of our collective attention. It is a system that is not working and a system that needs to be fixed. We are focusing a little bit on academies this morning and we are covering this from all different angles. Are academies too focused on academic success at the expense of some children with SEND? So first of all, I think I need to say probably that i think a focus on academic results is not a bad thing it helps children to the next stage of life and i'm sure that most parents would actually agree with that statement um but i i would i would agree that this should not come at the expense of

our of the well-being of our children and we heard minister mckinnell at the beginning of the program and again in the clip that you played uh, talking about that. This Secretary of State, Bridget Philipson, wants a system where all children both achieve and thrive. And I think that's a great vision for our education system. And I think it also sets a new political narrative. So we haven't heard that word thrive or we haven't heard conversations about the need for our children to flourish in belong and where our system of special educational needs is based not on deficit constructions of what children can't do or how children fail, but actually that we put dignity and belonging at the heart of the system that we build together. This is a very important subject for our audience so I'm going to put some of our listener questions to you if I may. One listener whose child is at an academy school emailed us saying the child is not getting the one-to-one support set out in her education healthcare plan

which is the legal document. Can an academy ignore an EHCP? No they can't. No type of school can ignore an EHCP because an EHCP is a legally binding document. There are ways in which parents can raise their concerns if they feel that their child is not getting the support that's in the legal document. And actually, an EHCP offers greater legal protection than perhaps a child that doesn't have an education, health and care plan. So no type of school can ignore what a legal document requires of them. Another mum emailed to say she spent 10 years battling to get her son's needs met at his academy, but complaints and appeals fall on deaf ears. 10 years i mean you know that's that's most of his education uh we reported at the beginning of this piece the aura that the local government ombudsman wants more power so it can deal with complaints about academies

it says the current system is not logical and fair what do you think is that a good idea so so one of the difficulties that we've got in state education in England is we're running two systems of state education. We're running a local authority school system and an academy school system. And the routes for redress, the routes for complaints are different in those two different types of systems. Now, that's not ideal. I recognise that. And parents find that really hard to navigate. So we kind of we need to do better, don't we? But it's not it's not true. It's not fair to say that there's no redress for parents in academy schools. There is a form of redress. It's actually through the Department for Education. But that's not that helpful to parents who find it difficult to navigate the system. I'm going to go to a text that's come in from Ben Palmer who says the statutory guidance related to directing children off-site to improve behavior does not apply to academies. This means some children are off-rolled with no educational provision and abandoned. This leaves vulnerable students including those we send with little support even if they have an EHCP and often does not meet its duties under the legal legislation. What do you think what do you say to

that as a local authority? So I think this term off-rolling needs a little bit of explanation if that's all right with you Anita. Yes of course. So the Ofsted definition of off-rolling is actually quite simple. So Ofsted says off-rolling is the practice of removing a pupil from a school role without using a permanent exclusion when that removal is in the best interest of the school rather than the best interests of the pupils. So there's no actual legal definition of off-rolling. But interestingly, in 2019, Ofsted wrote a really important blog, which set out how they intended to inspect schools in relation to off-rolling. So they said, we know that disadvantaged pupils, those with special educational needs, those with low prior attainment are more likely to be off-rolled in this way, using their definition.

And they made a commitment through their inspection framework in 2019 to look at this when they inspect schools. Now, again, I would say that off-rolling, unfortunately, sadly, has been found, was found by Ofsted in all types of school structures. It's less and less found now because Ofsted had included it in their inspection framework in 2019. So I hope that that helps. I think we're getting to a better place. Leora, there's so many questions still coming in. We'll have to get you back in to discuss them at some point

because there's lots more. And, you know, you've advised governments, you've sat in education at the highest level for such a long time. I think you will have, no doubt, lots more to say on this. So we'll put another date in. Leora Krodas for now. Thank you so much, the CEO of the Confederation of Schools Trust.

Please keep your questions and thoughts coming in because we are collating them. And as you know, we will be coming back to this very important subject. But now actually, I'm going to introduce my next guest. Just read a message that's come in straight from Sue Davis. And she says, saw Kim Cipher and her band perform in Ross on Why last week, captivating. I haven't felt so alive in a long time. How about that, Kim? Oh, that's amazing. Isn't that good?

Oh, I see. I'm going to come back to you. But before I do, I just need to read out a statement, if I may. The Department of Education spokesperson said every child and young person deserves the best life chances and the opportunity to achieve and thrive, which is why we announced a significant £1 billion investment into the sense system in the budget but in a system that is so skewed towards specialist provision and over reliance on ehc plans it often it's often only families who have the resources to fight that can get the right support we're determined to rebuild families confidence in a system so many rely on the reform families are crying out for it will take time but

with a greater focus on our mainstream provision and more intervention we will deliver the change that is so desperately needed. Back to you Kim. I'm going to intro you properly. Funky saxophonist meets 1940s jazz singer is the way my next guest has been described. Saxophonist, composer, vocalist, regular performer on the London and UK jazz circuits, including sold out performances at Ronnie Scott's. But it could have been so different for you, couldn't it? Because you were a primary school teacher for 17 years, Kim. A previous life of mine, yes. Primary school teacher.

Take us back to the beginning then. Before all of that, where did your love of jazz come about? Well, so I mean, I've always loved music. don't know you know from an early age I just felt that I could go up to any instrument and just I was drawn to it you know I wanted to pick it up and play it um and my mum and dad always had big band music going on um my dad used to stand in the lounge and pretend to conduct the band you know so there was music all the time at home how magic I know it wonderful. And then one year my sister and I were bought a piano and I just remember going up to it and thinking, oh yeah, play some melodies on the piano. So it kind of started from there

and it just became this kind of almost obsession with music. And when I found the saxophone, it was just like that moment of like, wow. What was it? Because people often say it's the hardest, hardest thing to pick up. What was it about the saxophone? Oh the hardest hardest thing to pick up what was it about the saxophone oh I don't know I think because I went through you know the usual instruments like

recorder and I dabbled a bit on the piano and then I played the clarinet but for me they they weren't sort of they weren't funky enough they weren't enough to allow me that sort of um slightly rebellious kind of expression and when I found the sax it was just like yes now you're talking yes right funky and rebellious it's not a coincidence that Lisa Simpson plays the sax it was just like yes now you're talking yes right funky and rebellious it's not a coincidence that lisa simpson plays the sax i know it's so cool um so and then you went off and you met your husband mike yes at the and we it's a reason we mentioned it mentioned him because he's in the room he's gonna be playing in the band um but then it was the and he went into banking he went into teaching yeah and then decided to change your lives completely. Well, we did. I mean, we both loved music from an early age and we were always in bands.

We met in the Gloucestershire Youth Jazz Orchestra when we were 15. And I think, you know, that was always kind of the path we wanted to take. But I think. So why not? Well, so I think back in the day, if you said you wanted a career in music, they didn't really know what to do with you. You know, what do you mean a career in music? It's a hobby. So my career advice was with insurance companies and banks. And I did actually work in a bank for a year.

And then I realised that that wasn't the route for me. So I ended up training to be a teacher purely because the course was expressive arts. So it allowed me to play and compose and do other expressive, creative things, which filtered me into the primary school role, which I absolutely loved. You know, working with the children and doing music, it was wonderful. And we started the programme, you know, we had that huge lengthy debate, the conversation about children with special educational needs. Presumably within your classroom, children thrived. it's not yeah i mean but the thing is with with all children can do music

you know and this is what the beauty of the arts is is that you know all children can do it in their own way they've got to be allowed that freedom but you know it's difficult because when you're in the classroom and you want to create music you have to have noise and of course all the other teachers would be like oh can you keep the noise down a bit it's like well no we can't we're making music wonderful bring the noise all children can do music you haven't heard me play recorder oh that'll be all we need to know no one needs to hear that um and uh and then i also need to ask you about this i read that you recently turned down at a local music festival because they said they already had a female saxophonist. What was your response to that?

I was shocked, I think. Well, I'm part of something called Women in Jazz Media, which is founded by a good friend of mine, Fiona Ross. So we're all about kind of, you know, women can do just as well. But it's a bit more of a struggle, perhaps, in the world of music. So I was quite taken aback. I won't name in shame but um yeah it was a festival I've played at before I always go down an absolute storm and um yeah they said they wouldn't book me because they already had one of those

yeah and the stupid thing is is that um you know just because we're female sax players we're not all the same you know we're all different well we're gonna hear that right now we're gonna hear you perform I'm very excited would you like to go and take your place i'm very excited about this um in fact when i walked in the studio manager said you're going to be dancing today anita i'm very ready for a bit of a dance today uh so this is uh from their third album it's called catching moments um and the piece is called bertie bertie Bertie. It's about your rabbit. I'll let you tune up and get your reed ready and whilst you're doing that I'm going to introduce you to the rest of the band.

The musicians are Mike Green on electric bass, Richard Hughes on piano and Kim's husband Mike Cipher on drums. Yes! Oh Kim, that was so good. Who's Bertie, by the way? Bertie, Bertie, Bertie? Oh, Bertie, my rabbit.

Well, one of my rabbits, Bertie. Don't tell Molly Moo. She'll get jealous. And we've had a message in from Sarah saying, yay, music for smiling and dancing. Yes, absolutely. Thank you. So thank you to Kim Cipher who was on saxophone.

Brilliant. Mike Cipher on drums. Mike Green on electric bass. Richard Hughes on piano. And you can find out more about the new album Catching Moments and forthcoming tour

on the website. It's kimcipher.com. Thank you. What a joy for a Thursday. Thank you so much. And thanks to all of you with your messages. Another one here,

I'll email, John Moore emailed to say the evidence highlights how our educational system is centred on a misplaced objective, academic success rather than helping to create balanced, skilled and confident people as a society we're failing our children

with this narrow perspective and system please keep your thoughts and opinions coming in you can continue to do so by emailing our website and do join me tomorrow for more Woman's Hour I'm going to be joined by the soprano Marina Costa-Jackson, who's making her debut with the Royal Opera in a new production of The Tales of Hoffman.

She'll be speaking about her struggles with performance anxiety and more music she's going to sing for us live. And Maggie O'Farrell will be talking about her third children's book, When the Stammer Came to Stay. Do join me then. That's all for today's Woman's Hour. Join us again next time. Hello, this is Marion Keys.

And this is Tara Flynn. We host a podcast you might like for BBC Radio 4 and BBC Sounds called Now You're Asking. Each week we take real listeners' questions about life, love, lingerie, cats, dogs, dentists, pockets, or the lack of,

anything really, and apply our worldly wisdom in a way which we hope will help, but also hopefully entertain. Join us why don't you? Search up Now You're Asking on BBC Sounds. Thanking you. I'm Sarah Trelevan, and for over a year,

I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered. There was somebody out there who was faking pregnancies. I started, like, warning everybody. Every doula that I know. It was fake. No pregnancy. And the deeper I dig, the more questions I unearth. How long has she been doing this?

What does she have to gain from this? From CBC and the BBC World Service, The Con, Caitlin's Baby. It's a long story, settle in. Available now.