About the “Moving On” Project
Skill Northern Ireland has been successfully addressing the inclusion of people with disabilities and/or learning difficulties within the Further Education system with the objective of ensuring that any person with any degree of disability should be able to access the form of Further Education they perceive to be suitable for them.
Skill NI has been becoming increasingly aware that there is a particular need to address the opportunity imbalance for young people with complex and multiple disabilities.
The project objectives are:
Work with young people with complex and multiple disabilities in schools, intensive support units and colleges to generate an awareness and acceptance that each of these young people with complex and multiple disabilities have the right to make a choice regarding transition to FE college provision.
Work with young people with complex and multiple disabilities to create inter-agency structures, which will enable those choices to be accepted and supported.
Work with young people with complex and multiple disabilities to develop and promote mechanisms within the five Education and Library Boards in Northern Ireland, which will enable those choices to be implemented through inter-agency co-operation.
To ensure that the necessary systems are in place to support the staff in both special schools/ intensive support units from which young people with complex and multiple disabilities come and the Further Education colleges to which they are going. This is necessary to ensure that young people with complex and multiple disabilities are guided in the choice that they make and that their choice can be achieved.
Statistics:
Official statistics show that around one hundred young people with disabilities and/or learning difficulties are leaving special schools in Northern Ireland each year. Of these around 20% would be classed as having complex and multiple disabilities and for these young people at present there is often no choice other than day care provision. There are little opportunities and too few support systems to enable them to enter any form of Further Education.
Principles
All of this work will be underpinned by six basic principles to which every agency involved will be asked to publicly accept. These principles are based on the following ‘promises’ to be made to young people with complex and multiple disabilities:
- To listen to you and treat you with respect.
- To help you keep safe, healthy and fulfilled.
- To enable you to make choices about your life.
- To encourage you and challenge you to achieve your ambitions.
- To enable you to take your place in the community.
- To speak up for you when you want us to.
The project is backed by a province wide NI Steering Group with representatives from young people, parents, local schools, further education colleges, statutory bodies, the Department for Employment and Learning and the Department of Education.
This steering group considers issues of policy, practice and resources and will take agreed recommendations of the central steering group back to their own agencies. These will also be published in the Skill NI newsletter for wider dissemination.
Every year in Northern Ireland approximately twenty young people with complex and multiple disabilities leave special schools and for the most part move to intensive support units within day care centres. It is hoped that by the end of this project an effective transitions process will empower young people with complex and multiple disabilities to make their own choices about post-school provision.
The Moving On Project
