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approach the special school and ask their advice about this, then speak to the SEN department at the LEA and state your preference. then you need to list the reasons you want your son to go to this special school, ie list the ways they will meet his needs better than the mainstream one currently does. e.g. smaller class sizes mean..... for your son, higher staff rations will mean.... etc. look a the prospectus and admission criteria for the special school and use that to help your case. also list the reasons that the mainstream school is not the best place to meet his needs and why, but acknowledge the pros too as this isn't about it being a bad school, just not the best place for your son in your opinion.I fought for 18 months to get my son into a special school when he was in mainstream, ironic given he has severe learning disabilities! but I wanted him to go to the local MLD school and really had to prove why this was a better option for him than mainstream or SLD secondary would have been. the local high school was great, and offer a lot, but there were a lot of drawbacks, even with the excellent provision they had, things specific to my son, so the place was huge, and he's growth restricted and tires easily, he was still soiling but would have to keep his changes in the disabled toilet, so what if he was in another block when he had and accident, and he'd have had to leave classes early to prevent him being trampled when the bells went, he takes stairs very slowly and several classes would be upstairs, but the clincher for me was that he would get no support at lunch time so was free to abscond (and he would have back then!) and come home, putting him at serious risk at harm, and if staying on site during lunch would have had to eat in the SEN unit to have adult supervision thus isolating him from his peers. for the MLD school I went to work on their communication status and my sons communication needs, on the small classes, on the lack of need for 1:1 TA due to high staff ratios, the small size of the school, the shower facilities if he had an accident, an on site school nurse for his medical problems etc. takes time, but can be done. I also said I was prepared to go to tribunal if he was turned down, and stated that in virtually all correspondence and he was the first child from my LA to get into this school (in a neighbouring LA) without a tribunal!

You can name the school you want. The lea will either agree to it or will disagree and then you will have to go to tribunal. Then you will need a lot of evidence to support your case.You might want to speak to someone at ipsea or SOS!SEN for advice on how to get the school.

Contact your local Parent Partnership person. Mine helped me recently with what to write to SEN dept etc and supported me getting my AD into an ebd school. Here I had to write my reasons in a letter, as LOB says, then request a change of provision, then a panel meet to look at evidence. It helped that AD's mainstream school were not exactly fighting to keep her.

Thanks all, looks like we probably have a bit of a battle on our hands, oh well I guess we're getting pretty used to that. Will try SOS sen etc, and try to get some extra advice. Thanks again!

Appeal its a pain but do it they bank on the majority giving in.We moved last year.Took 6 mnts to get AC age 6 PMLD into school of choice.Did not get into protracted argument just said we would home school if our choice not allowed.We did this and before it went to appeal they dropped their case and agreed our school also pay our travelling expenses for school run which is a big help.So good luck and im sure there are red pointy boots you can borrow out there.....