Humber SEND Conference: here's what you missed!

What a day! The Humber SEND Conference was our first full day, in person event and we couldn't have asked for a better day.

As a service our mission is to support children, young people, families and school settings by removing barriers to learning. We've been doing this for 12 years across the north of England and according to our schools, we're pretty good at it. But with increasing demand on our service, increasing complexity of need and pressures on school staff and budgets, we felt that we had to try and offer our support in different ways. So, we designed the conference with the aim of supporting schools to do more with less.

With David and LJ from our Hull team along with special guests, we offered five sessions aimed at SEND Leaders, focusing on child, class, systemic and staff levels. We've summarised the sessions in other blogs which you can read here (SEND first classrooms, What's Your Strength?, Half a million minutes, Traffic light teachers, How to be an overnight, overwhelm Jedi), but we wanted to reflect on the day and the amazing feedback we've received because there was a feeling in the room that we were really meeting SENCOs where they were at. And as a service, it doesn't get better than having professionals leave the room feeling inspired, motivated and believing in themselves.

To sum up that feeling, Catherine, who attended the event says it better than we could:

I have never sent an email after a course before and although I am quite chatty don't usually do something like this. 

I attended the conference in Hull yesterday and it would be remiss of me to not act upon the messages that were shared. I am therefore sending this email to thank you for organising such an uplifting and inspiring conference. I was made to feel welcomed and valued by the Applied Psychologies team. The speakers were all amazing and have certainly given me lots to think about, be inspired by and to go back to school and do. Not because I have been told to, but because they made me believe that I could.

I have been a SENCO for many years. I took up the role initially because I love working with children who see things differently and who challenge me to think in a different way. Being a SENCo at the moment is a role with many hats and I regularly feel that not one of them actually give me the opportunity to actually work with children. 

Its been a while since I left a course and then didn't need to just sit in my car for a bit. Being a SENCO is overwhelming, everyone thinks you know all the answers, that paperwork only takes an hour and I regularly feel that I am rubbish at my job because I never get to the end of that job list.

I left today feeling much more positive and empowered. I heard the speakers talk about things we do at school and also about things we used to do at school, things that have been lost and I still feel are important. 

I will be sending a message to the Trust SEN lead and telling her what a difference today has made to me. I hope that when I get back to school I am able to act upon the positive feelings and increased confidence that the course has given me. 

You asked for feedback, its simple really. All term I have been increasingly overwhelmed and seriously considering if I was the best person to be the SENCO in school, today I believe I can be. Thank you for that reminder.

Catherine

We are so proud to have received this feedback and other comments of a similar feel. It makes the hard work worthwhile knowing we've helped SEND Leaders believe in themselves and go back into school with renewed vigour. It doesn't get any better for us as a service!

Thanks to Catherine for sharing her feedback, to everyone who attended and to our speakers. We're already planning for the next event and we hope to see you all there!