SEND Local Offer Annual Feedback Summary 2024
Thank you to everyone who has shared their feedback on the Local Offer this year. Your input has helped us make some great improvements to the website and the services we offer.
Page contents
- Feedback gathered from visitors to our Local Offer website
- Peer review
- Feedback gathered about our Enquiry Service
- Feedback gathered after our Showcase event
- Feedback gathered from the Accept, Teach, Listen, Access, Support (ATLAS) group
Feedback gathered from visitors to our Local Offer website
This year, we've added a feedback tool at the bottom of each page, enabling visitors to indicate whether they found the content helpful with a simple yes or no. They can also leave additional comments in the free text section.
As a team, we meet monthly to review the feedback and determine the next steps. The feedback tool has been very well received, and we're thrilled with the high volume of responses.
| Was the information helpful? | Total |
|---|---|
| Yes | 107 (61%) |
| No | 69 (39%) |
Peer review
In late 2024, the Local Offer team at Buckinghamshire carried out a review of our Local Offer site. This comprised reviewing our Local Offer's compliance against aspects of the SEND code of practice which relate to what Local Offer's must or should publish.
The review gave a score of Yes (Y), Limited (L) or No (N) based on how successful we were in meeting the requirements.
| Peer review scoring summary | Total |
|---|---|
| Yes | 20 |
| Limited | 2 |
| No | 1 |
Feedback gathered about our Enquiry Service
Alongside the Local Offer website, there is also an email enquiry service. We aim for this service to be responsive and thorough. The most common themes of our enquiries was similar to previous years and were:
- Signposting families to support services
- Request for the contact details of a practitioner supporting a family.
- Information requiring updating/adding on the Local Offer website or Directory.
Generally the feedback received has indicated that most people are satisfied with the service they receive in response to enquiries. A sample of some of this feedback is below:
- "Gosh, amazing quick reply - thanks so much, much appreciated"
- "Thank you so much for this wonderful email full of ideas"
- "Thank you. I am not sure I ever expressed how grateful I am for these link. I wish you and your fabulous service much support"
Feedback gathered after our Showcase event
The quadrant based Community Connectors at Surrey County Council are responsible for promoting and raising awareness of the Local Offer in the community. This regularly involves attending community settings where families and young people are present. A theme from discussions with Parent/Carers was that they were sometimes not aware of what support is available locally.
In 2023, the Community Connectors therefore organised four Additional Needs Showcases, which are large marketplace events where local services showcase "their offer" to parent/carers and practitioners. It is hoped by the Connectors that by gathering a range of services together at once, so we can create the opportunity for parents and carers to hear about services who'll be helpful to them and for practitioners to meet one another and increase their understanding of what support they can signpost families to.
In 2024 we held a further event in Cranleigh in collaboration with Surrey's parent carer forum Family Voice Surrey. The event was well attended and afterwards a feedback survey was sent to all attendees. The results of which were:
I found the Showcase helpful
| Option | Total |
|---|---|
| Strongly Agree | 77% |
| Agree | 15% |
| Neither Agree or Disagree | 8% |
| Disagree | 0% |
| Strongly Disagree | 0% |
The services present were helpful to me, my child or my work
| Option | Total |
|---|---|
| Strongly Agree | 69% |
| Agree | 23% |
| Neither Agree or Disagree | 8% |
| Disagree | 0% |
| Strongly Disagree | 0% |
Further Showcases should be held in Surrey
| Option | Total |
|---|---|
| Strongly Agree | 87% |
| Agree | 13% |
| Neither Agree or Disagree | 0% |
| Disagree | 0% |
| Strongly Disagree | 0% |
Given the positive feedback we have received, we are planning several more Showcases with Family Voice Surrey in 2025.
Feedback gathered from the ATLAS group
ATLAS is one of the Surrey Youth Voice participation groups. It's aim is to raise voices on important topics from the perspective of young people with additional needs and disabilities living in Surrey.
In 2024 we met virtually with ATLAS to find out about their experiences using the Young People's section of the Local Offer. Full details of what we found out can be found on our Meeting with ATLAS regarding the Local Offer webpage.
Below is a summary of the feedback and the actions we have taken.
How do ATLAS find the Young People's section now?
Our first question was how ATLAS found the Young People's section currently. The feedback was on a scale of 1 to 10, using different smiley or sad face emojis instead of each number. The average score was 5.
What did ATLAS like or dislike about the Young People's section?
Next we asked ATLAS to write or say what they liked or disliked about the Young People's section. The responses are below:
- "I liked the initial photos, but once you click on 'preparing for adulthood,' and then the smaller subsections there is a lot of text".
- "I would like to see the long paragraphs of text broken apart. Maybe include some bullet points and integrate photos throughout".
- "I like the bit where it has related content, that's super helpful. It saves you time searching around for stuff".
- "I like how on the pages of info, there is almost a contents so you can click, and it takes you down the page to the specific bit, instead of having to scroll"
- "like that it had photos and pictures and not just loads of text".
- "I found it hard to navigate at first, but I liked the symbols and photos".
What topics on the young people's section are most important to you?
We asked ATLAS to look at the topics on the young people's section and tell us which are most important to them. All members ranked the topics by importance. The results below are listed from most important to least important:
- Mental Health
- Preparing for Adulthood
- Surrey Youth Voice
- Education, Health and Care plan reviews
- Post-16 education and training providers
- Travel assistance and transport
What else did ATLAS tell us?
ATLAS also told us their favourite social media channels were Instagram or Tik Tok. A number of members also indicated they would they be interested in writing articles or blogs for the Local Offer?
What we have done with the feedback?
- We updated the images on the Young People's section, to make them more visually appealing.
- We changed the order of the topics on the Young People's section, to the order ATLAS said was of most importance to them
- We have an approved process for children and young people to submit blogs or stories to the Local Offer for publication on the Young People's section. We will start publishing these in 2025.