Asked by: Julia Lopez (Conservative - Hornchurch and Upminster)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to ensure that young disabled people are able to participate in work experience.
Answered by Anne Milton
We want all young people with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) to be able to access high quality external work placements. This is so they can benefit from real life work experience in the same way as any other student.
The Government is aware that SEND students may require more support when embarking on a work experience placement. We have recently launched a work placements Capacity and Delivery Fund which will receive £74 million in additional funding from April 2018. This will help providers boost their capacity to provide work placements from 2018/19.
We expect providers to use some of this fund, alongside other available funding (e.g., High Needs Funding), to provide additional support and any reasonable adjustments within the workplace. This will enable students with SEND to access the same quality of provision as their peers.
Asked by: Julia Lopez (Conservative - Hornchurch and Upminster)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to ensure that young disabled people are able to access good quality careers advice.
Answered by Anne Milton
The Government is taking steps to improve careers education and guidance for all ages. We are investing over £70m this year to help young people and adults access quality careers provision.
The Government is also funding specialist training for careers advisers working with young people who have special educational needs and disabilities (SEND). And we will be supporting post-16 providers in developing training and materials to help young people entering the workplace.
The careers strategy, which will be published shortly, will include proposals to improve the quality and coverage of careers advice in schools. In particular, these will provide aspirational careers advice for children, young people and adults with SEND.