Accessibility Plan

Aims

Schools are required under the Equality Act 2010 to have an accessibility plan. The purpose of the plan is to:

Increase the extent to which disabled pupils can participate in the curriculum
Improve the physical environment of the school to enable disabled pupils to take better advantage of education, benefits, facilities and services provided
Improve the availability of accessible information to disabled pupils

This plan has been written to meet the requirements of the school to carry out accessibility planning for disabled pupils as stated in the Equality Act 2010 and SEND Code of Practice 2014.

The SEN and Disability Act 2001 extended the Disability Discrimination Act 1995 (DDA) to cover education. Since September 2002, the Governing Body has had three key duties towards disabled pupils, under Part 4 of the DDA:

not to treat disabled pupils less favourably for a reason related to their disability
to make reasonable adjustments for disabled pupils, so that they are not at a substantial disadvantage
to plan to increase access to education for disabled pupils.

The Definition of Disability under the Equality Act 2010 states that a person has a disability if:

‘They have a physical or mental impairment that has an adverse, substantial and long term effect on their ability to carry out normal day to day activities.’

Our school aims to treat all its pupils fairly and with respect. This involves providing access and opportunities for all pupils without discrimination of any kind.

Visions & Values

1. We are committed to providing a fully accessible environment which values and includes all pupils, staff, parents and visitors regardless of their education, physical, sensory, social, spiritual, emotional and cultural needs. We are committed to challenging negative attitudes about disability and accessibility and to developing a culture of awareness, tolerance and inclusion.

2. Montpelier Primary School plans, over time, to increase the accessibility of provision for all pupils, staff and visitors to the school:

Improve access to the physical environment of the school, adding specialist facilities as necessary. This covers improvements to the physical environment of the school and physical aids to access education.
Increase access to the curriculum for pupils with a disability, expanding the curriculum as necessary to ensure that pupils with a disability are as, equally, prepared for life as are the able-bodied pupils; This covers teaching and learning and the wider curriculum of the school such as participation in after- school clubs, leisure and cultural activities or school visits. It also covers the provision of specialist aids and equipment, which may assist these pupils in accessing the curriculum.
Improve the delivery of written information to pupils, staff, parents and visitors with disabilities. Examples might include handouts, timetables, textbooks and information about the school and school events. The information will be made available in various preferred formats within a reasonable time frame

3. We acknowledge that there is a need for ongoing awareness-raising and training for staff and governors in the matter of disability discrimination and the need to inform attitudes on this matter.

4. The Accessibility Plan should be read in conjunction with the following policies, strategies and documents:

Curriculum
Equal Opportunities and Diversity
Health & Safety (including off-site safety)
Special Educational Needs & Disability
Behaviour for Learning
Safeguarding Policies

The accessibility plan will be made available online on the school website, and paper copies are available upon request.

Our school is also committed to ensuring staff are trained in equality issues with reference to the Equality Act 2010, including understanding disability issues.

The school supports any available partnerships to develop and implement the plan.

Our school’s complaints procedure covers the accessibility plan. If you have any concerns relating to accessibility in school, this procedure sets out the process for raising these concerns.

Legislation and guidance

This document meets the requirements of schedule 10 of the Equality Act 2010 and the Department for Education (DfE) guidance for schools on the Equality Act 2010.

The Equality Act 2010 defines an individual as disabled if he or she has a physical or mental impairment that has a ‘substantial’ and ‘long-term’ adverse effect on his or her ability to undertake normal day to day activities.

Under the Special Educational Needs and Disability (SEND) Code of Practice, ‘long-term’ is defined as ‘a year or more’ and ‘substantial’ is defined as ‘more than minor or trivial’. The definition includes sensory impairments such as those affecting sight or hearing, and long-term health conditions such as asthma, diabetes, epilepsy and cancer.

Schools are required to make ‘reasonable adjustments’ for pupils with disabilities under the Equality Act 2010, to alleviate any substantial disadvantage that a disabled pupil faces in comparison with non-disabled pupils. This can include, for example, the provision of an auxiliary aid or adjustments to premises.

Action Plan

This action plan sets out the aims of our accessibility plan in accordance with the Equality Act 2010.

View the tables, click here.

Monitoring arrangements

This document will be reviewed every 3 years but maybe reviewed and updated more frequently if necessary.

It will be approved by the headteacher.

Links with other policies

This accessibility plan is linked to the following policies and documents:

Health and safety policy
Equality information and objectives (public sector quality duty)
Special educational needs (SEN) policy and information report
Supporting pupils with medical conditions policy
Diversity & Equal Opportunities Policy

About this policy

Date of policy: Autumn 2021
Review date: Autumn 2024
Reviewed by Headteacher reporting to SDC