Team around the child meetings

Having an autistic child has meant a ton of paperwork and along with that alot of meetings. At the moment we are currently going through the process of trying to get Blake a EHCP ( educational health care plan). 

One of these meetings are called Team around the child meetings. I wasn't too sure about what to fully expect from my first meeting which was 2 hours long and I found to be rather draining. 

WHAT IS A TEAM AROUND THE CHILD MEETING?

A Team Around The Child (TAC) meeting is where professionals and agencies that are working with a child come together to make sure that they are all  working on the same goals and sharing relevant information.

WHO ATTENDS A TEAM AROUND THE CHILD MEETING?

It depends on your child. But you will want people that are working with your child regularly there. The key people have are of course parents and key workers from nursery/school.  To give you an idea here are some of the professionals I sat around a conference table with at a meeting a few weeks ago: 

- Health Visitor 

- School Key worker

- Blake's teacher

- School SENCO

- Additional SEN worker from school

- Keyworker from the Early Support Care Co-ordination  (ESCO)

Other people you may want involved are:

- Speech and language therapist 

- PORTAGE or childrens centre staff 

It's important that professionals who aren't able to attend send over any relevant information for the meeting. 

WHAT IS THE AGENDA AT A TEAM AROUND THE CHILD MEETING?

It really depends on each individual childs needs. For us our first meeting was about making sure we all have the right information and paperwork and what's happening in regards to Blake getting a EHCP and how things are going at school and what's in place along with any worries the school had.

A typical meeting may follow this agenda.

1. Welcome and Introductions. Not everyone will know each other.
2. Share information
   1. Shared documents, are there documents that need to be shared such as progress reports, assessments or diagnosis letters. For example the ESCO keyworker had a diagnosis letter however we never got a copy or school.
   2. What is working well at the moment? It is great for everyone to share what works. 
   3. What support is currently needed? Is anything not going so well, can others offer support in these areas or do you need to access support from elsewhere? An example of this is Blake is currently not under any Speech and language therapist which he really needs.
3. Have we got a plan / outcomes?
4. What needs to happen next, are there any further people who need to be involved and need to have a referral to for example and do you have goals that you are all working together on with the child. 
5. Who will take oversight of that plan? For every action agreed at the meeting someone needs to be responsible for it. This is to make sure it actually happens. For example we will be looking around the local SEN school to get a feel for it. The health visitor will be chasing up on getting speech and language therapy involved. 
6. Next Meeting Date. Agree when the group needs to meet next, this will depend on the child’s needs. Our next meeting will be in November when we should have heard about if we have been accepted for an EHCP.

It's important that someone writes down the minutes of the meeting so they can be sent out for everyone to refer to and so that anyone who wasn't able to attend the meeting is kept in the loop.