Memorandum submitted by Afasic
INTRODUCTION
Afasic is the UK-wide parent-led charity representing
children and young people with speech and language impairments.
Speech and language impairments can arise as a consequence of
other disabilities such as hearing impairment or cerebral palsy,
in which case they are described as secondary speech and language
impairments. However, Afasic primarily represents children and
young people with specific speech and language impairments, that
is to say those who do not have any other form of disability.
More than 1 million children and young people in the UK have some
degree of difficulty with speech and language. While speech and
language therapy enables some of them to overcome their impairments
while they are still young, 1 in 500 has a severe and persistent
speech and language impairment that will affect them throughout
their lives. Children and young people with speech and language
impairments may have difficulty with any or all of the following:
— interacting appropriately with
other children and adults;
— acquiring literacy and numeracy
skills;
— accessing the curriculum at
school or college;
— making friends and acquiring
social skills; and
— understanding the world and
acquiring independence skills.
Speech and language impairments are a "hidden"
disability. Young people with speech and language impairments
look no different to anybody else, so their disability is not
immediately apparent. It may not even be obvious from their speech.
Many young people with speech and language impairments may appear
superficially to talk quite fluently. They may well have developed
"coping" or "masking" strategies that conceal
the real extent of their difficulties from anyone who is unfamiliar
with speech and language impairments, and, regrettably, as awareness
of these disabilities is very poor, young people will meet few
people who understand their needs. The small number of professionals
who specialise in speech and language impairments usually work
with pre-school or school-aged children. The assumption appears
traditionally to have been that most children with speech and
language impairments "grow out" of their difficulties,
so there is no need for adult services to cater for them. Even
though we now know that speech and language impairments do not
necessarily "go away", there does not appear to have
been any change in this assumption, and so many young people with
speech and language impairments, of secondary school age and older,
fail to have their needs met or even recognised. A further complication
is that the nature of speech and language impairments means that
many young people are not able to form any clear understanding
of or explain how their disability affects them. Some do not even
appreciate that they have a disability. Thus they find it difficult
to seek the support they need.
Young people with speech and language impairments
generally have normal intelligence levels, but their attainment
levels are often depressed by their disability. As a result, they
tend to underachieve at school. Although there are exceptions,
most young people with speech and language impairments go on to
FE colleges after leaving school at 16.
AFASIC'S
CURRENT EXPERIENCE
OF FURTHER
EDUCATION
Many of our members and callers to our helpline
tell us that their experience of FE is often very disappointing.
The failings appear to be at all levels but particularly notable
are:
— An assumption that most students
on "mainstream" courses, ie courses not specifically
for students with learning difficulties or disabilities are "normal",
and a consequent failure to recognise that many such students
actually have various types of special needs and to provide the
support necessary to meet those needs.
— The poor liaison between tutors
on mainstream courses and tutors in learning support departments,
with a complete failure to adequately integrate the support students
need within their courses.
— The complete failure of tutors
on mainstream courses to understand the issues that affect a student
with speech and language impairments and to address these adequately
within their course.
— Many FE courses, even at NVQ
level 3, do not equip students with the professional skills they
require to obtain a job in the field they have supposedly been
trained for.
— Many students, especially those
with speech and language impairments and other disabilities, require
not only training in job-related skills but also in other essential
life skills which they rarely receive.
— There is often no proper advice
to ensure that students enrol on courses that will actually equip
them for the world of work. All too often it seems to be the case
that advisers (principally schools and Connexions advisers) are
more concerned with ensuring that students do something so that
they are accounted for, than with taking the time to help the
student and his or her family identify the most appropriate way
forward for them. As a result, FE often ends up for many students
being simply a way of filling two years, rather than part of a
structured educational path that actually leads to employment
and a fulfilling adult life.
— Similarly, there is often little
if any support to enable students leaving FE to move into the
world of work. At the very least students need guidance on developing
the necessary interview skills, and writing CVs. Many students,
such as those with speech and language impairments, who generally
have poor communication skills and low self-esteem as a result
of years of struggling at school, need much more intensive support
to enable them to move on from FE into employment. This is rarely
forthcoming and so it is easy for many young people to "give
up" at this stage and settle for a life characterised by
unemployment interspersed, perhaps, with a series of dead-end
casual jobs.
— There are real issues around
access to examinations for students with speech and language impairments,
and other disabilities, and also for other students who find formal
written examinations difficult. Where "academic" testing
is not essential, other ways need to be found of assessing students'
skills and enabling them to gain accreditation.
THE NEEDS
OF YOUNG
PEOPLE WITH
SPEECH AND
LANGUAGE IMPAIRMENTS
Their learning profile and special needs mean
that students with speech and language impairments need holistic
services that equip them with:
— practical work skills they can
transfer to the workplace;
— proficient literacy and numeracy
skills;
— functional communication and
social interaction skills, including speech and language therapy
as needed;
— independence and life skills,
such as understanding and using money, including in the (more
abstract and less obvious) form of cheques, credit cards etc;
— organisational and planning
skills, eg remembering appointments and turning up for them with
any necessary information etc; and
— being able to cope with change,
or other unexpected problems eg a train being cancelled, or traffic
being diverted because of roadworks.
Currently, this sort of integrated support structure
tends to be confined to the specialist courses for students with
learning difficulties and disabilities. These, however, are generally
pitched at a very low (entry or pre-entry) level and are rarely
suitable for students with speech and language impairments who
are often working towards level 2 or even level 3 qualifications.
It is true that most FE colleges have learning support departments,
but these need to be wider in scope and integrated more fully
into the courses students are taking. The intake of some FE colleges
consists very largely of students with special needs and others
who have underperformed at school and, if their needs are to be
met, the FE system needs to be much more inclusive, taking the
needs of students as their starting point, rather than the traditional
way they have done things. This should ensure that all students
who require it would have ready access to the support they need,
if necessary within small specialised units. This, in turn, would
mean post-16 skills training forming an integral part of the path
that leads from the dependence of childhood to the fulfilment
of employment and an independent adult life.
14-19 specialised Diplomas
It is difficult to comment in detail on the
proposed Diplomas as so little is known as yet about their format
and content. In principle, Afasic is strongly in favour of an
alternative, less academic route for young people who lack the
interest or aptitude for "A" level-type qualifications.
We are, however, concerned that Phil Hope, the Minister for Skills,
was recently quoted as saying that the Diplomas "were not
vocational". We are unsure what was meant by this, but an
approach that emphasises the writing of essays, or compilation
of detailed project work, over the acquisition, practice and thorough
understanding of more practical skills is likely to be too demanding
for many young people with speech and language impairments, and,
it must be said, others with various special needs, or who are
simply not engaged by a formal, academic approach to learning.
It is important to understand the impact of
speech and language impairments on the way that our young people
learn. Generally speaking, mainstream education is delivered through
the medium of language, and this is fine for people with strong
verbal skills, who can put together and deliver an essay or presentation
relatively easily, and have no trouble reading and absorbing large
amounts of written text. Young people with weak language skills,
though, find this extremely difficult and daunting and, over time,
become increasingly disenchanted with education and develop very
low self-esteem. Yet, young people with speech and language impairments
are capable of learning much, including achieving adequate literacy
and numeracy skills and holding down many skilled and responsible
jobs. They simply need to be taught in a way that is accessible
to them, that is to say through carefully managed and structured
practical experience.
It is very much our hope that the proposed specialised
Diplomas will provide this type of education and training. If
they do not, they will fail to meet the needs of young people
with speech and language impairments, and indeed of many other
young people who currently are unable to access the academic style
that is still the norm within (school-based) education.
One other factor to be borne in mind is that
young people between the ages of 14 and 16 are still nominally
at school. Those with special needs, which includes young people
with speech and language impairments, are entitled to appropriate
support. Some young people with special needs have statements
which place a legal duty on their LA to provide them with the
specified support. It is important that the increasing use of
FE colleges to educate these young people does not lead to any
compromise in the support they receive. As few FE colleges have
access to speech and language therapy, and few staff even in colleges'
own learning support departments have any knowledge of speech
and language impairments, there can be no complacency about this.
Ideally with the increasing integration of the 14-19 education
sector, the support systems for special needs would be aligned
more closely with the protection of statements extended to all
young people in education (up to the age of 19), not just those
in schools.
FINAL COMMENTS
The outlook for young people with speech and
language impairments whose needs have not been recognised and
met can be bleak. Many face lives of social deprivation characterised
by periods of unemployment, or intermittent casual work. Some
drift into anti-social behaviour and crime (a study conducted
in 2004 by Professor Karen Bryan of the University of Surrey found
that 60% of inmates in a Young Offenders Institute had speech,
language and communication difficulties). Yet others face lives
blighted by isolation and poor mental health.
A positive experience within education, and
particularly within the 14-19 stage, that recognises and meets
their needs could help young people with speech and language impairments
avoid the poor outcomes many of them face now, and play an important
part in facilitating a successful transition to adult life for
the young people Afasic represents.
Students need to leave full-time education equipped
with skills that will actually enable them to obtain and retain
employment. This means that FE colleges, and other providers,
must have a realistic understanding of, and give accurate information
about, the types of jobs their courses provide training for. This
does not always happen at the moment, leading to confusion and
disappointment for many students. For example, some students enrol
on catering courses expecting them to lead to jobs as a chef or
other high-level position, only to find that they have not acquired
the necessary professional skills and can only secure a dead-end
job helping in the kitchen or waiting at tables.
One way of avoiding this would be by moving
away from college-based provision for what are supposedly vocational
courses towards more "apprenticeship"-type courses for
the majority of young people who leave school at 16. If well organised
these should offer a clear route into employment through on-the-job
training with back-up from FE colleges for the classroom-based
elements of the course including, for those who need it, training
in life skills and other special needs support. If such a system
were able to guarantee employment, and a defined career-path,
to all students who completed the course satisfactorily, this
would provide a clearer and more direct route into employment
for many young people, particularly for those who find this more
difficult than most, such as young people with speech and language
impairments.
We very much hope that these inquiries will
lead to educational and training provision for young people with
speech and language impairments that genuinely meets their needs
and enables them to move into adult life with the confidence and
skills that will equip them to make a success of their lives.
January 2007
|
