Next steps- assess and plan

The EBSA support plan is a structured and adaptable strategy, involving relevant stakeholders, to develop, implement, and regularly review personalised interventions that address identified needs of a child or young person at both school and home, ensuring strategies effectively meet unique situational challenges.

• using all the information gathered and your outline, this next stage provides the plan for the strategies and interventions to address the concern.
• careful consideration needs to take place to ensure all the relevant people are involved in and contribute to this planning to ensure it fully addresses all identified areas.  The EBSA support plan provides a structured way to identify potential interventions, detail their implementation (who, what, when, where, how), and consider how each intervention will address one or more identified problems and fit within the 5 ‘P's framework. The EBSA support plan is designed to help identify potential interventions and outline how they will be implemented. Each intervention should be designed considering the unique circumstances and needs of the student, as detailed in the outline.  The interventions will greatly depend on the specific needs of the child or young person and the nature of the issues identified through the previous phases.  The EBSA support plan is intended to guide the initial development and implementation of interventions. It should be revisited and updated regularly as part of the ongoing monitoring, review and evaluation of the interventions' effectiveness. Remember, the most used strategies are not always the most successful strategies.  The specific strategy is not as important as the extent to which the strategy effectively meets the situational challenge.  The plan needs to be individualised to the child or young person and hence why it is crucial when pulling together the support plan that it must clearly link to the factors that have been identified through assessment as contributing to EBSA.  It also needs to intervene at both school and home level.  A good repertoire of strategies will help to meet the demand of a particular individual situation.  

It is also important to remember when forming the support plan: 

• collaboration with the child or young person and their parent or carer and other professionals’ involvement.
• person centred, ensuring they have ownership of the plan.
• focus on removing barriers rather than a reliance on referring to services.
• be realistic and break down larger goals into small, achievable steps; an overly ambitious plan is likely to fail.  
• be clear about roles and responsibilities from the outset and ensure that all parties agree to actions and keep to them until the next review period. 
• write agreed review dates into the plan; keeping the plan under regular review.  
• be consistent and follow through on agreements until the next review.
• build into the planning process the anticipation there may be ‘bumps’ in implementing the plan and include a commitment from all parties to find solutions when that happens.  
• ensure any concerns about the reintegration process are not shared in front of the child or young person; a ‘united front’ is recommended.  While the child or young person is central to all planning, concerns should be communicated away from them.  
• keep optimistic.  If the child or young person doesn’t attend on a day as planned, start again the next day with the agreed plan.  
• don’t be tempted to move the goalposts if the child or young person is doing better than expected.  This can reduce trust.  Wait until the agreed next review point to make any changes.  
• agree expectations regarding frequency of contact and set realistic response times for direct telephone contact between parent/carer and key workers in school.  
• recognise that the child or young person is likely to be more unsettled at the beginning of the plan and that school and parent/carer needs to work together to show a consistent approach to managing heightened emotions and anxieties.
• plan for a gradual and graded reintegration.  Early home visits by a designated member of staff, ideally with whom the child or young person has a positive relationship with will support a sense of connection and ‘school belonging’.  
• a part-time timetable may result as part of the gradual and graded reintegration, but should be clearly planned as part of the reintegration to avoid the push of the child or young person to the illusory safety of avoidance.  
• detail the strategies and approaches that will support the child or young person to achieve the outcomes agreed.  Including flexibility in the timetable, arrangements for transport, buddying opportunities, safe havens in school, key person the child or young person can ‘check in’ with during the time they are in school, differentiation of curriculum to address any potential gaps from missed lessons.  
• ensure all school staff (including supply staff) that the child or young person will come into contact with are fully aware of the plan and the child or young person’s difficulties, particularly during changes of class or other transition times.
• any involvement from professionals not currently involved.  
• agree the work that will be sent home to be completed and ensure feedback is consistently provided around marking.