In most cases, the Local Authority will expect your son or daughter to attend the nearest FE college.   

This may be the right placement.  But it depends on what your son or daughter wants to do - usually at 16 the young person has the right of appeal, including against the placement named in their Education, Health and Care plan.

If your child has an EHC plan then the decision about staying on in a sixth form or moving to a FE college should have already been considered at the Review in Year 10. 

Bear in mind that most FE colleges operate on 3 days a week and you may need to consider what your young person is going to do for the other two days of the working week.  

In some cases, the young person might wish to pursue a vocational choice for which the local FE college cannot offer an appropriate course - or the course might not enable the young person to be able to get a job at the end of the course.  In that case, a more specialist college may need to be considered.  

In  most cases, specialist colleges are going to want to undertake an assessment to see if they feel they can meet the needs of your young person, and what kind of support is likely to be needed. A placement at a specialist college usually involves a residential placement and the Local Authority is likely to argue that the local FE college can adequately meet the needs of the young person.  

If you are not satisfied with the placement the Local Authority is offering, you can appeal.  For more information about how to appeal, see here.

See Common Problem 2

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