Queen Margaret Primary School strives to ensure that the culture and ethos of the school are such that, whatever the abilities and needs of members of the school community, everyone is equally valued and treated with respect. Pupils should be provided with the opportunity to experience, understand and value diversity. Inclusion is at the heart of all that we do alongside with our values.
Our school is committed to ensuring equal access for all its employees, pupils and other members of our school community with any disability. We will ensure that anyone with a disability is not treated less favourably in any procedures, practises and service delivery. Everyone regardless of their abilities are included to all aspects of school life.
Under the Equality Act 2010, schools are required to have an accessibility plan. The purpose of the plan is to:
Our school aims to treat all its pupils fairly and with respect. This involves providing access and opportunities for all pupils without discrimination of any kind.
Our school is also committed to ensuring staff are trained in equality issues with reference to the Equality Act 2010, including understanding disability issues. Our school supports any available partnerships to develop and implement the plan to provide purposeful inclusive environment.
We have endeavoured to include a range of stakeholders in the development of this accessibility plan. The plan will be made available online on the school website at all times, and paper copies are available upon request.
Our school’s complaints procedure covers the accessibility plan. If you have any concerns relating to accessibility in school, this procedure sets out the process for raising these concerns, as with any other concerns or complaints within school.
‘A person suffers a disability if he or she has a physical or mental impairment that has a substantial and long term adverse effect on his or her ability to carry out normal day-to-day activities’. Physical or mental impairments can include sensory impairments (such as those affecting sight and hearing) and learning difficulties. The definition also covers certain medical conditions when they have a long term and substantial effect on pupils’ everyday lives.
This document meets the requirements of schedule 10 of the Equality Act 2010 and the Department for Education (DfE) guidance for schools on the Equality Act 2010.
The Equality Act 2010 defines an individual as disabled if he or she has a physical or mental impairment that has a ‘substantial’ and ‘long-term’ adverse effect on his or her ability to undertake normal day to day activities. Under the Special Educational Needs and Disability (SEND) Code of Practice, ‘longterm’ is defined as ‘a year or more’ and ‘substantial’ is defined as ‘more than minor or trivial’. The definition includes sensory impairments such as those affecting sight or hearing, and long-term health conditions such as asthma, diabetes, epilepsy and cancer.
Schools are required to make ‘reasonable adjustments’ for pupils with disabilities under the Equality Act 2010, to alleviate any substantial disadvantage that a disabled pupil faces in comparison with nondisabled pupils. This can include, for example, the provision of an auxiliary aid or adjustments to premises.
Here at Queen Margaret Primary School we recognise our duty under the above acts:
The school recognises and values parents’ knowledge of their child’s disability and its effect on his/her abilities to carry out normal activities. We respects the parents’ and child’s right to confidentiality, and encourage a partnership between parents and school to help facilitate the child’s needs.
The school provides all pupils with a broad and balanced curriculum. The curriculum is scaffolded and adjusted to meet the needs of individual pupils and their preferred learning styles. It endorses the key principles of the National Curriculum Framework which underpin the development of a more inclusive curriculum: setting suitable learning challenges; responding to pupils’ diverse learning needs; overcoming potential barriers to learning and assessment for individuals and groups of pupils.
The plan covers all three main strands of the planning duty:
The plan will contribute to the review and revision of the school’s other policies and documentation, where inclusion for all, and guidance under the Equality Act 2010 will be followed.
Queen Margaret Primary School aims to include all pupils, including those with disabilities, in the full life of the school. Our strategies to do this will include:
By examining our library and reading books to ensure that there are examples of positive images of disabled people. Making inclusive displays and aspirations displays with famous people who have disabilities.
Queen Margaret Primary School recognises that monitoring is essential to ensure that pupils with disabilities are not being disadvantaged, and that monitoring leads to action planning. We will monitor:
