Referrals to the EPS
The Educational Psychology Service (EPS) is made up of a group of educational psychologists working for Medway Council.
The service works with:
- children and young people aged up to 25 years
- teachers
- parents
- carers
- other professionals
They mostly work with children or young people in mainstream schools as well as those with specialised needs or who attend special schools or mainstream units, such as those with significant learning, behaviour, physical, language or sensory needs.
The focus is on helping school staff to support children and young people as early as possible.
The EPS:
- advises the council about how to meet the needs of all children and young people, whether they have special educational needs or not
- has a legal duty to provide psychological advice to the council in the event of a child or pupil being assessed for an education, health and care (EHC) plan of their special educational needs
- also links with other agencies when appropriate, such as the health service and the child and adolescent mental health service (CAMHS)
Trainee Educational Psychologists
The EPS also offers placements for Trainee Educational Psychologists (TEPs) in years 2 and 3 of their doctoral training course. This is organised through the London and South East Universities’ placement panel.
We offer TEPs good supervision, opportunities for strategic work, and high quality administration support within a compact and close team. TEPs will need to have use of their own car when working in Medway.
How EPS works with other agencies
The Educational Psychology Service (EPS) has always had strong links with both professionals in the children's care teams and local health providers, in particular with the paediatricians and the child and adolescent mental health service and speech and language therapists.
The EPS believes that schools provide an excellent focus for many types of multi-agency work to take place. Meetings like the 'in school review' also give an opportunity for effective consultation across agencies, with many benefits for all the services involved.
Referrals to the EPS
Individual pupils are mainly referred to an educational psychologist through the in school review (ISR). This meeting provides an excellent opportunity for the EPS to be involved in addressing the needs of many pupils who are a cause for concern.
Pupils are also referred to us when they are being assessed for an education, health and care plan of their special educational needs, as agreed by a special panel known as the Decision Making Group.
Parents who are concerned about their child’s educational progress should discuss this initially with the class teacher, the school's Special Educational Needs Coordinator (SENCO) or the headteacher.
Should the pupil continue to experience difficulties, the SENCO may decide to raise the pupil's name for discussion at the next in school review.