Multi Agency Single Point of Access (MASPA) Protocol

MASPA aims to be early interventionist in nature, offering regular access to multi agency advice and support to schools for school age children and young people who appear to be making reduced educational progress due to barriers to learning.

1. Purpose/Remit of Rural Swale Multi Agency Single Point of Access

• Support, advise and plan for any child or young person who has joined the cluster with complex needs or for whom a setting, using all their resources – financial and human, has not been successful in meeting the needs of the child or young person.

2. Principles of Rural Swale Multi Agency Single Point of Access

• Support, advice and planned provision for children and young people is focused on using available multi-agency expertise and resources and on provision intended to support mainstream inclusion.
• Schools, cluster staff and agency colleagues work collaboratively, as equal partners, in order to meet the needs of all children in the Cluster.
• A culture is developed within the Cluster that promotes the development and adoption of innovative problem solving approaches.
• Prevention and early intervention underpin decision making and planning.
• Planning for resource allocation takes account of the need for fair and equal access to available resources, based on identified priorities.
• Engaging the child or young person and their parents or carer is to be strongly encouraged

3. Membership

Core

• LEO
• Cluster HT Representative
• Educational Psychologist
• Specialist Teacher – Behaviour
• Specialist Teacher – Cognition and Learning
• Specialist Teacher – Communication & Interaction
• Locality AEN Officer
• School – bringing individual cases
• Parent Support Advisor
• Education Welfare Officer
• Schools Nursing Service
• Primary Mental Health specialist / worker
• Social Services representative

Other Input (depending upon individual case)

• Specialist Teacher, Bilingual and Minority Ethnic Achievement
• Early Years SENCO
• Pre-school SEN Teacher
• Early Years Advisory Teacher
• Extended Schools Development Manager
• Locality Schools SEN Officer
• Physical and Sensory Service
• Speech and Language Therapist/Occupational Therapist/Physiotherapist
• Looked after Children officer
• Exclusions officer
• Other agencies as appropriate

4. Access to support and advice

1. Schools requiring the support / advice of individual cluster team members will request and access support directly from them as has been the case to date.
   
2. Schools requiring to consult / refer to other single agencies including Family Welfare Association, Social Services, School Nursing and CAMHS, will request and access support directly from them as has been the case to date.
   
3. Having made best use of existing resources* if there remains a concern about the child’s lack of educational progress due to barriers to learning, the school may be assisted through MASPA in the form of advice and / or support, accessing a multi disciplinary approach. This will be in cases where more than one member of the cluster team may be required to advise and / or support, or a combination of members of the cluster team, working closely with colleagues from other agencies.

   *both from within the school and having accessed support / advice from the cluster team

4. Schools requiring urgent advice and support from agencies where there are grave concerns around the child’s health and well being, or where a child may be at risk should still consult directly with the relevant agency, in most cases this will be Social Services.

5. How to access MASPA

1. Schools are required to fully complete the MASPA access form (available in our cluster web area), whilst consulting with parents around the need to share the school’s concerns at this meeting. (see 3. Parent / carer  consent)
   
2. The school submits the MASPA access form to the cluster PA through an attachment to email, marking the email as: CONFIDENTIAL RURAL SWALE MASPA. It is advised that the email is sent requesting a delivery receipt to ensure that the document has been received and acknowledged.
   
3. The cluster PA will circulate deadline dates and times by which MASPA access forms must have been received in order to be allocated a place on the next available MASPA meeting. MASPA access forms received after these times will be reallocated to the subsequent MASPA meeting.
   
4. On receipt of the MASPA access form, the cluster PA will acknowledge to the sender that this has been received.
   
5. Once the published deadline has passed the cluster PA and the LEO will collect the access forms together in order to agree the agenda for the forthcoming MASPA meeting and set the time slots during the meeting in which the cases will be discussed.
   
6. The timed agenda for the forthcoming meeting together with the access forms will be circulated via email to those multidisciplinary professionals who are expected to attend the MASPA meeting. This will be around one week prior to the MASPA meeting in order to give those professionals an opportunity to consider the content of the access forms in advance.
   
7. Once the timed agenda has been agreed, the cluster PA will send this to those schools who submitted access forms and who have an allotted time on the agenda.

6. Parent / Carer Consent

1. It is common practice that schools involve parents in all concerns around a child’s lack of educational progress. Prior to a child being referred to MASPA, the school will have been using its existing resources and this is likely to have also involved cluster team members. Parents / carers will have been informed of these developments and are usually involved in the interventions that have attempted to address the barriers to learning. Therefore when the school feels that it is necessary to access MASPA it follows that the parents / carers are also informed. This should be stated on the access form.
   
2. In the case where a parent refuses to engage in working with the school and cluster team members, access may still be made to MASPA, in the best interests of the child. In this case the school should make it clear that parent / carer permission has not been gained. It may be the case that as part of the discussion at MASPA work is commissioned to attempt to engage the parent / carer.
   
3. If at MASPA it is felt that there are concerns around the child’s physical or mental health, or that there are serious social services concerns, the relevant agency professional attending MASPA may advise that the school completes a direct referral to that agency. In such a case, the school will need to make clear on the referral why the parent has not been involved in the referral if this cannot be secured.

7. The MASPA Meeting

1. The meeting will be chaired by the LEO. Agreed actions and advice given will be minuted by the cluster PA who will be in regular attendance.
   
2. The meeting will be fortnightly, and lasting no more than two hours in duration, to be regularly attended by multi – agency professionals.
   
3. Schools are invited to send a representative (e.g. SENCO, headteacher, class teacher, teaching assistant) to briefly introduce the circumstances that have led to the access request. It is not essential for the school to attend, but this may assist the quality of the discussion and outcomes. The school representative is only expected to remain for the duration of the time that the relevant case is discussed.
   
4. The meeting will be conducted in a brisk, action focussed manner in order to cover as much business as possible in the time of the meeting.
   
5. Where follow up support is commissioned, the meeting will identify a lead person who is responsible for ensuring the action and intended outcome is implemented as planned within the agreed timescale.
   
6. Following the meeting the cluster PA will distribute the minutes of the meeting to all members of MASPA. Schools will be sent the minuted actions / advice for their referred cases only.
   
7. The cluster PA will also request that the cluster admin. support worker inputs the relevant data into the Impulse system.
   
8. The school will have responsibility to feedback to parent/carer the outcome of the meeting.

8. MASPA and its relationship with District Inclusion Forum (DIF)

1. The District Inclusion Forum is multi agency in nature and plans for children and young people who are at grave risk of exclusion, have been excluded or who are already out of school for a variety of reasons. In contrast MASPA is designed to offer early multi agency intervention advice and support.
   
2. If it is the decision of professionals attending MASPA that the case may be more suitably considered by DIF then the LEO will recommend to the school and chair of DIF that this be the case. The opposite can also be recommended.