About the Local Offer

What is the Local Offer?

The Local Offer gives children and young people with special educational needs or disabilities and their families, information about what support services will be available in their area.

Every local authority must talk with children and young people with special educational needs or disabilities and their families to find out what sort of support and services are needed. There will be many different types of services that children and young people may need, including support services in school and specialist health services.

Children, young people and their families may also have ideas about what leisure activities should be available, and what services are needed to help young people move towards independence in adulthood.

Every local authority must have a Local Offer that is available online, and must make sure that people without access to the internet can also see it. The local authority must tell children and young people and their families how they can find out more about the Local Offer. The local authority will then decide what services to make available.

Tell us what you think about the Local Offer

Every local authority must get feedback on its local offer from young people and their families. They must show what feedback they have been given and say how they are going to make improvements to the Local Offer and services.

A Local Offer should also include information about what transport services are available for children and young people with special educational needs or disabilities and if there is any help available to pay for these services.

Follow Derby's SEND Local Offer on Facebook.

You may also want to visit the Derbyshire Local Offer to see what is available across the county.

Every year we publish an annual report to give an update on how the Local Offer has developed in the past year.

SEND newsletter

Our SEND newsletter is produced each school term. The newsletter tells the story of what is going on across the city to help young people, parents and professionals stay up to date.

If you've got a story to tell or want to give us your views on our newsletter, you can get in touch by emailing local.offer@derby.gov.uk.

Get involved, have your say

We want to know what you think of our Local Offer so that it works better for you.

Young person's feedback

Parent carer feedback

Local Offer User Group

The User Group meets four times a year to discuss and approve new and revised content for the Local Offer webpages. This is in collaboration with parent carers, professionals and other representatives from related organisations. These Terms of Reference expand on the purpose of the group. We are always looking for parent carers interested in joining the group. Please email Local.Offer@derby.gov.uk to express your interest.

The first User Group meeting was held on Wednesday 24 November 2021. You can read the latest meeting notes and actions agreed.

Derby's Local Offer is monitored at the local area co-production delivery group. This group includes representatives from parent groups and the voluntary sector, as well as representatives for agencies and services across the local area. They are responsible for making sure that the Local Offer continues to develop and reflect the experiences of young people and their families across the city. When we need to develop or update areas of the Local Offer, we will arrange small working groups or talks with champions from across local services.

You said, we did

We will always listen to your feedback to help us to improve the way the Local Offer works.

Summer term feedback

Issues	Outcomes
You said the new Derby SAL service should be on the Local Offer	We created space for it in the Professionals Zone
You said there should be a formal local Area SEND strategy	We co-produced the Living My Best Life Strategy
You said you did not like the name Local Offer	We looked again at our branding to make sure it linked to our strategic vision of 'Living my best life'
You said the News page needed updating to include more about the good things happening in the city	We refreshed the content and created the Include and Inspire blog, reflecting stories from young people, parents as well as professionals

Spring term feedback

Issues	Outcomes
You said the EHCP Myth Buster didn’t reflect everything correctly	We have reviewed this document and we will have a specific webpage to pick up mythbusters instead of our hidden word document, as part of our reviewed EHCP section
You needed a formal assessment of your needs as a parent carer	We co-produced the Parent Carer Needs Assessments Guide
You said there were updates to the travel information	We uploaded revised travel policies, forms and new leaflet for young people
You required multiple revisions to the health and wellbeing page	We co-produced fresh content with the agency champion