Message from Alison Ismail - Director for SEND and Alternative Provision at the Department for Education

Dear colleague,

I hope this message finds you well. I am writing to introduce myself as the new Director of the SEND and Alternative Provision (AP) Directorate in the Department for Education (DfE). This is a very exciting time to be joining DfE and taking up this important role; and I look forward to working with many of you over the coming months on how best to deliver on our shared ambitions to improve the experience and outcomes for children and young people with SEND, and those in AP, as set out in our March 2022 Green Paper.

Consultation on the Green Paper closed on 22nd July, and I thought it would be helpful to give you a brief update on the current position. We are continuing to consider thousands of responses received through our e-consultation and from the 175 consultation events – many thanks to all of you who participated. As you can imagine, working through all this feedback is a major task; and we continue to engage with colleagues in the SEND and AP systems as we develop our next stage of proposals. We remain committed to publishing the Government’s response to the Green Paper consultation in a National SEND and AP Improvement Plan by the end of the calendar year.

As you may already be aware, confirmed portfolios for our DfE Ministerial Team have now been published on gov.uk. I am pleased to confirm that Kelly Tolhurst, Minister for Schools and Childhood will be responsible for SEND and AP. More details about the new minister’s portfolio are at https://www.gov.uk/government/people/kelly-tolhurst; wider ministerial portfolios can be accessed at the bottom of the DfE homepage at: https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/department-for-education.

Thanks, and I very much look forward working with you.

Best wishes

Alison

Director of SEND and Alternative Provision

Department for Education