FAQs

Inclusion hubs are small groups within a mainstream school for children with additional needs. They allow children to continue to be educated in their mainstream school by providing extra support. This means that children can stay with their friends and peer group but still have access to the help and specialist support they need. 

The proposed inclusion hub at Cottons Farm primary would have specially trained teachers, and teaching assistants as well as access to therapeutic support such as speech and language, and occupational therapy.

It will also include improved facilities such as a a sensory room and outdoor space with specialist equipment.

Unlike in a special school or enhanced resource unit, children accessing an inclusion hub won't always need to have an education, health and care plan. Admission to the hub will be decided by the local authority in partnership with the school and trust.

Cottons Farm Primary School is a relatively newly built school. it has space within its existing building to develop an inclusion hub, which makes it a cost-effective way to add capacity to the support we can offer in the City.

You can find the school here

The school is based in Sinfin, and is part of the Harmony Multi-Academy Trust. It's location in the City means that it gives us good coverage of specialist, primary age provision in the City. Our other primary age provision are:

• St Giles Special School (in Chaddesden)
• Brackensdale Spence Academy, Enhanced Resource (in Alvaston)
• Springfield Primary School, Enhanced Resource (in Spondon)

Creating specialist provision across the City willmake it easier for children to get the support they need closer to home.

You can find out more about St Clare's Special School on their Website

St Clare’s is a Community Special School for children with moderate learning difficulties and associated needs including moderate ADHD, autism, hearing impairment, language and communicating, visual impairment and physical impairment. 

Pupils will have an Education, Health and Care (EHC) Plan to enable them to access the school.

The school is located in Mickleover, but serves children from across the City of Derby and southern Derbyshire. 

It currently accommodates about 147 students with learning difficulties and other complex needs. The school spans an academic ability range from P6 to Foundation Stage GCSE. Students have moderate to severe learning difficulties and other associated needs. Many students have moderate autistic needs and have additional social and emotional needs.

In response to students needs, the school offers a full and diverse curriculum with specialist support. The progress that students make is judged as outstanding as a result of the teaching and support available to them and the progress that they make academically, socially and emotionally.

We have five other excellent specials schools in Derby. They are:

• St Giles' Special School (primary age)
• Ivy House Special school (all ages)
• St Andrew's Special School (secondary and post 16)
• St Martin's Special School (secondary and post-16)
• Kingsmead Special School (secondary)

These schools cater for different areas of SEND in the city.

All of these schools have had some capital investment from the local authority in recent years to improve their buildings or to increase their capacity.

Increasing our secondary specialist provision is a key element of meeting our new strategy and ensuring that fewer children need to be educated out of the city. Improving St Clare's environment will help us to have a more sustainable offer at secondary stage.

These enable children and young people with SEND to access the mainstream curriculum alongside their peers. Specialised facilities and specialists are attached to the provision, with help from teachers, therapists and others whose expertise is needed.

They have additional funding to build up expertise and resources to work with pupils with high level needs.

They are accessed by children with an EHCP and admission is controlled by the local authority

The four sites selected were identified though our call for views. They expressed an interest in having an enhanced resource and we then worked with the schools and used the intelligence in our joint strategic needs assessment to ensure that they were supporting the right area of need to improve provision in the city.

They give us a good geographical spread of enhanced resources to compliment our existing enhanced resource at the Bemrose School.

These schools also have some capacity within their existing building to allow us to develop enhanced resources at a much lower cost than if we were to construct new buildings or acquire new sites.