Send Officer

Number of Vacancies:

1

Time Type:

Full time

Worker Type:

Regular

Proposed Interview Date:

Tuesday, July 14, 2026

Hours of Work:

37

Hiring Manager:

Kelly Hare

Contact Number: 

01482 612917

Job Description Summary:

This is a Full Time, Permanent Position

We are seeking an experienced and forward-thinking SEND Officer – Reforms to play a pivotal role in shaping and delivering a reformed SEND pathway while maintaining robust statutory compliance and high-quality frontline services.

This is a critical post responsible for designing and embedding a consistent end-to-end SEND workflow, aligned to emerging SEND reforms, that strengthens:

• Quality Assurance (QA) arrangements
• Tribunal readiness and response
• Early resolution and de-escalation of disputes
• Consistency of EHCP decision-making and practice

You will ensure the service continues to meet its statutory duties under the Children and Families Act 2014, while actively transforming practice to improve outcomes, reduce complaints, and build confidence with families and partners.

For an informal discussion about the role, please contact Kelly Hare on 01482 612 917 or [email protected]

If the postholder requires a Standard or Enhanced DBS disclosure the candidate is required to declare full details of everything on their criminal record unless the conviction/s and/or caution/s are considered “protected” in line with filtering rules for DBS checks.

ROLE AND PURPOSE

To provide a proactive and responsive service for children, young people, and their families with SEND.

To have operational responsibility and line management of complex send case work to ensure that those children and young people with complex SEND have appropriate educational placements secured that enable them to meet their educational outcomes, prepares them for adulthood and that meet the local authority’s statutory duty.

To have line management responsibility for SEND caseworkers and support staff including work allocation, supervision, quality assurance of work and budget control, ensuring service standards performance indicators, and statutory requirements are met.

Responsible for decision making for key elements of EHCP case work and ensuring that all communication and contact with young people, parents and schools is timely, supportive, and constructive, so that confidence in the service is maintained and improved. To have operational responsibility for ensuring high profile cases have a dynamic Education Health and Care Plans (EHCP) that accurately represents the child or young person and their needs.

To prepare the local authority’s statement of case and take the lead on and represent the local authority at SEN Mediation and First Tier Tribunals as well as respond to complaints and negotiate on a regular basis with Solicitors/MP Offices, complaints, and the Freedom of Information Team.

To be a link officer for named special schools and facilitate and lead termly monitoring meetings to ensure that all children and young people are receiving a positive experience within their education setting and be able to provide a proactive service to ensure timely action on potential risks. To maintain electronic and paper records in accordance with service standards ensuring accurate case recording of all aspects of the EHC process.

To support the continual improvement cycle by quality assuring the work of the SEND caseworkers and undertake case audits as part of the services Quality Assurance Framework.

To deputise as required for the SEND Team Manager in their absence.

 

PRINCIPAL ACCOUNTABILITIES:

1. To promote and safeguard the welfare of children, young people and/or vulnerable adults acting as the person responsible to co-ordinate support throughout the SEND process to ensure that good outcomes are achieved and to progress safeguarding concerns in line with policy and procedure.

2. Customer Focus –To provide a proactive and responsive front facing service for children, young people, and their families with SEND.Support the Team Manager to use customer feedback to inform service improvement and practice.Support the Team Manager to ensure parents and young people with SEND play an active part in service development and identify innovative solutions (sometimes in the face of significant challenge) which minimises the need for parents to seek remedy through the SEND Tribunal arrangements.Provide training, support and advice to schools , educational providers and other key stakeholders to develop their capacity to meet pupil needs in respect of SEND.Alongside the Team Manager,work with senior school leaders to negotiate and sometimes direct a school to admit a vulnerable or challenging learner.Communicate local authority decisions about SEND provision and negotiate on behalf of the authority where there are disputes or disagreements.

3. Performance Management –To ensure the effective supervision of staff (including PDGR’s) to secure high levels of performance and improved customer service satisfaction.Responsible for the quality and timeliness of work undertaken by SEND caseworkers. To ensure changes in legislation are interpreted and implented effectively into policy and operational practice.To ensure the consistent application of operational practice and policy across the team.To bring to the Team Managers attention any areas of concern that may impact on service performance. To ensure that SEND case workers are up to date with mandatory training and to raise any performance issues with staff as appropriate and agree a plan of action to support their development.

4. Statutory Obligations –Ensure the requirements of Part 3 of the Children and Families Act 2014, the SEND Code of Practice 2015 and other relevant legislation and policy are met.

5. Manage and develop a small team of SEND Caseworkers and Casework Assistants ensuring practice is in line with the Children and Families Act 2014 and that performance indicators are met.

6. To verify and approve Draft EHC Plans and Notice of Amendments, ensuring that decisions are legal and made in accordance with available resources to ensure that they provide value for money and quality.

7. Alongside the Team Manager, analyse trends in referral rates and other data to forecast/plan work and to ensure that financial implications are recorded and reported on.

8. To support SEND case workers at complex multi-agency meetings as necessary and undertake strategic review meetings of education placements in maintained and independent non-maintained special schools and other educational settings, alerting the Team Manager to any placement/provision issues that arise.

9. To ensure that EHC plans, and interventions support young people to prepare for adulthood. Working in partnership with other agencies and services as appropriate, including working alongside colleagues in adult services to ensure that wherever possible systems and processes align in a way that supports the positive transition of young people with Special Educational Needs and Disability into adult services.

10. Manage the SEND Tribunal process ensuring that all deadlines are met, producing detailed working documents in liaison with families and specialist SEND Solicitors on cases. Present cases at SEND Tribunals where approprate.

11. Accurately record, input, and maintain case records as per service standards.

12. Negotiate at mediation sessions on behalf of the Authority using an appointed Mediation Service.

13. Oversee the phase transfer of pupils in accordance with the statutory deadlines as laid down the SEND Code of Practice.

14. Contribute to the maintenance / retrieval of accurate, up to date information on service data bases, monitoring systems case management systems. Ensure up to date information is available for use by senior managers with regard to monitoring SEND / trends/ service performance and standards etc.

15. Maintain an up-to-date knowledge of any changes in legislation and case law relating to SEND and amend internal documents as required.

16. The Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 and associated legislation places responsibilities for health and safety on Hull City Council, as your employer and you as an employee of the council. In addition to the Councils overall duties, the post holder has personal responsibility for their own health & safety and that of other employees; additional and more specific responsibilities are identified in the Council’s Corporate H&S policy.

 

NC3502.SEND Officer.docx

Compensation Grades:

GRADES 9.

Pay Ranges:

£39,862.00 - £42,839.00

Job Classifications:

3- Not Politically Restricted - Designated As Not Politically Sensitive (Politically Restricted Posts), 5- Enhanced & Childrens Barring List - (Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS)), Casual - (Travel Allowance Policy), No - (Childcare Disqualification Requirement), No - (Statutory Post), OSP - Other Support Staff (School WorkForce Census)

Benefits of Working of Hull City Council:
- A competitive salary
- An excellent pension through the Local Government Pension Scheme (LGPS)
- Initially 23 days annual leave depending on length of service. You will also get eight public holidays per year, and three additional days off, one in May/August and one during the Christmas/New year period
- Career development and learning experiences from a range of training courses and learning methods
- Supportive and forward-thinking culture
- Great career development opportunities

Please ensure that you complete and submit your application by midnight prior to the closing date. Please ensure that your application demonstrates how you meet the essential criteria against the person specification as listed in the job description. 

We are committed to increasing the diversity, equality, and inclusion within our workforce to represent the people we serve and build an environment in which everyone can feel like they belong. We encourage people from all backgrounds to apply. 

We adopt a ‘name blind’ approach to shortlisting. Recruiting managers will not have access to personal information, including your name and contact details, until a shortlisting decision has been made. Equality monitoring information is not accessible by recruiting managers at any stage.

We reserve the right to amend the dates associated with this advert, which may include closing the advert early where required.

The Council is committed to safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children, young people and vulnerable adults and expects all employees and volunteers to share this commitment.

Online searches, including social media, may be carried out as part of the recruitment process.