WHAT THE EXPERTS SAY....
REFORM THAT WORKS: BUILDING A SEND SYSTEM
THAT ADAPTS TO EVERY CHILD Comment by HUGH VINEY, CEO and Founder of Minerva Virtual Academy
R
ight now, 1.7 million pupils in England are navigating a school system with SEND. That isn’t just a statistic; it’s a loud, clear signal that the traditional “one-size-fits-all” model is under immense pressure. At Minerva Virtual Academy, we’ve seen our community grow to over 1,400 students across 50+ countries in just five years. This rapid growth isn’t just about a preference for online learning; it’s a direct response to a mainstream system that is often too rigid to catch children before they fall.
The Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill is a major opportunity to address this, but only if we focus on the right things. Reform works when it changes how the system functions for a struggling Year 9 student on a Tuesday morning, not when it adds new layers of oversight. We don’t need more mechanisms to track the crisis; we need more capacity to solve it.
One of the biggest risks in the current Bill is the assumption that more control automatically equals better outcomes. Take the proposed register for home-educated children. While framed as safeguarding, it overlooks the “why”. Families aren’t leaving mainstream education on a whim; they are often pushed out by stretched SEND provision and limited flexibility. If we focus on monitoring families rather than addressing these pressures, we risk documenting the consequences of system strain instead of reducing it.
That reality is particularly stark for SEND families. For many, home or alternative education isn’t a lifestyle choice but the result of anxiety, bullying or unmet needs, making attendance unsustainable. Increasing scrutiny risks penalising parents responding to system gaps rather than closing those gaps. If we want better outcomes, the priority must be ensuring every child can access the form of education that works for them – whether that is a suitable mainstream placement, high-quality online provision, or timely access to well-resourced complementary support when a traditional setting is not viable. The most immediate lever for
improvement is flexibility. Whether it’s an elite gymnast balancing training, a child recovering from school-based trauma, or a pupil who learns more effectively online, digital schooling is not peripheral; for many, it determines whether they engage at all. A system that connects mainstream schools, specialist support and accredited alternative provision could intervene earlier, stabilise placements sooner and prevent attendance issues escalating into long-term absence.
Recognising online and hybrid schooling as part of the overall system capacity would support that shift. High-quality digital provision can strengthen mainstream inclusion by widening access to teaching, providing short-term stabilisation, and easing pressure on specialist places and transport budgets. But this only works if funding, commissioning and regulation allow local authorities and schools to use accredited providers easily when demand rises. Otherwise, flexibility exists in principle but not in practice.
The proposed approach to phone-free school days highlights a similar March 2026
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tension between principle and reality. Classrooms should be free from distraction during learning time, but for some pupils – particularly those managing anxiety or complex travel arrangements - phones also provide reassurance and a link to support. Policy must reflect the realities schools manage daily, ensuring the drive for focus doesn’t remove tools that help vulnerable pupils feel secure enough to attend.
More broadly, the Schools White Paper offers a chance to address the structural links between attendance, SEND provision and teacher retention. These are not isolated issues but connected signs of a system under pressure from rising complexity and limited adaptability. Mainstream schools are being asked to meet increasingly diverse needs within staffing, buildings and funding models that haven’t kept pace, contributing to disengagement, absence and staff burnout.
Flexible provision, including high-quality online education, is already showing how that pressure can be eased. At Minerva Virtual Academy, around 20% of our 1,400+ students are referrals from local authorities and state schools, often when leaders recognise that a different or complementary model is needed to re-engage a pupil. When the setting fits the child, outcomes improve: GCSE results match or exceed national averages, with 90% achieving grades 9-4 in English and 71.5% in Maths. Our SEND cohort outperforms the national average by nearly 40%, and attendance among dual- enrolled pupils averages 96.3%, including many who had previously struggled to attend. Engagement rises when education adapts to the learner, not the other way round.
As SEND reform progresses, Education, Health and Care Plans are expected to become increasingly focused on pupils with the most complex needs. That shift will only succeed if earlier tiers of support are consistently resourced and delivered in practice, not just recorded. EHCPs matter because they guarantee provision. If thresholds rise without matching capacity earlier on, help may arrive later, when
challenges have already intensified.
Children’s needs rarely fit neatly into administrative categories. Some mask difficulties, others fluctuate, and many need support before they meet formal thresholds. Systems overly reliant on eligibility criteria risk creating bottlenecks, leaving teachers managing unmet need while families struggle to secure appropriate provision, including specialist or non-traditional settings where required.
Ultimately, the success of both the Bill and the White Paper will depend not on how much oversight they introduce, but on whether they deliver earlier intervention, real flexibility and consistent support in practice. Reform should expand the system’s ability to respond to children as individuals – building genuine capacity, widening trusted provision and ensuring entitlement translates into action. With that focus, these reforms could help create a system that is genuinely responsive, inclusive and able to help every child learn, engage and thrive.
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