Gateshead Council aims to keep more children with special educational needs or disabilities (SEND) in mainstream schools.
According to council figures, the number of pupils taught in special schools in Gateshead has increased from 429 in 2015 to 711 in 2022. This equates to 2.23% of all school-age children.
Children who require additional education support can be given an 'Education, Health and Care Plan' (EHCP). Over half of the pupils with such a plan have places in special schools.
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A council report into special education provision stated: "Gateshead currently has a higher proportion of school-age pupils being taught in special schools as a percentage of the whole school population, compared with regional and national figures."
Suzanne Dunn, an education service director at Gateshead Council said: "We have had a really big increase, we sit at around 52% of children with an EHCP are currently in a special school, nationally is around 34-35%.
"So we have way more children with a plan in specialist provision. We can look at that one of two ways, either we are doing a really good job providing all these places.
"Or we may have some inconsistencies in our practice as to what we can expect in mainstream provisions.
"There may be shortages of some places for our complex children because maybe not all of the children need to be in those special schools if we get the provision right in the mainstream schools."
As part of a new draft SEND strategy, the council aims to "develop an Inclusion Support Structure across Gateshead for all stakeholders so that staff with the relevant expertise can be used to ensure more pupils are able to remain
in mainstream provision".
Gateshead Council is in the process of updating its SEND strategy which is open to public consultation.
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