Nexus Awards

Our resident SENCO, Abigail Hawkins, was recently nominated for a NEXUS award.  Under the category of Curriculum Innovation, her blog post about SEN Funding has been viewed many times.  (See the NEXUS post here: https://www.nexus-education.com/sen-funding/ or the original post here:  https://www.sendcosolutions.co.uk/sen-funding/

Using her many years as a SENCO she has written about SEN funding in language that parents and professionals can understand.  She has several videos over on her YouTube channel, SENsible SENCO, which also explain how the SEN funding formulae work.

Abigail said, “I think it’s really important that everyone understands how that formula is generated.  It gets rid of the myths around the fictitious £6000 SEN budget for every SEN child and can help schools construct their top-up funding arguments with the local authority where they are struggling to meet the needs of all their students.”

If it wasn’t accolade enough to be nominated for the NEXUS award, she recently let slip to the office that she’d received a certificate in the post.  Our resident SENCO has been recognised for her significant contribution to the teaching profession through her acceptance as a Fellow of the Chartered College of Teaching, the highest and most prestigious category they bestow.

Abigail was nominated by a Deputy Head Teacher she had worked with several years ago, and who she crossed paths with again as part of her work with Edukey in a Provision Maps training session.  Her nomination was seconded and referenced by an ex-Head Teacher of a special school who readily admits that he frequently phones Abigail for her advice on a variety of SEN matters.

We did check if that was all Abigail was up to, and she confessed she recently completed her Chair’s Course with the NGA (National Governors Association)…apparently she’s the chair of governors in three schools!  As part of the course, she produced a book – yes, an actual book, not a booklet – to help with the induction of new governors within the trust she works with.