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Short Breaks Eligibility 26

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Eligibility Criteria

Before requesting a short break, it’s important to check whether your child or young person is likely to meet the eligibility criteria.

Not all children with SEND will meet the threshold, if this is the case you can explore community activities on the Local Offer here: 

Find out more 

Special Educational Needs or Disabilities

Your child does not need a formal diagnosis to be considered for short breaks.
However, they do need to have identified Special Educational Needs or a disability, and there should be evidence that support is needed.

This is usually shown through:
• a SEN Support Plan from their education setting, or
• an Education, Health and Care Plan (EHCP)

If your child is home educated, the short breaks team will ask for reports or information (for example from a previous school or professionals) that will help them understand their needs.

Access to Universal Services

Short breaks are for children and young people whose needs mean they require more support than is typically available through Local Offer activities or other universal services.

This might be because those activities aren’t suitable, or because your child or young person needs additional support to take part safely or independently.

You can explore a wide range of Local Offer activities and groups here: Local Offer Things to Do. 

Before a short breaks application can move forward, families should have considered or tried Local Offer groups or universal activities where possible. 

If these haven’t been suitable or accessible, you will be asked to share why, so the short breaks team can better understand your child or young person’s needs.

Assessments Needed

To be considered for a Short Break, your family must have had an assessment in the last 12 months.

This should be completed by a Lead Professional using either:
• an Early Help Assessment (EHA), or
• a Social Care Child and Family Assessment (Sometimes called a Section 17 assessment)


These assessments help the short breaks team understand the needs of the whole family and whether targeted Short Breaks support is needed. An assessment is only needed for the first application — not for future reviews.

Information about your child's needs

Families will be asked to share information such as medical reports, education details or specialist assessments.
This helps us understand your child or young person’s needs and why they may need extra support during the day or night.

This could be due to physical needs, or because they need close or ongoing supervision to keep themselves or others safe.
This evidence will demonstrate the child's level of need is greater than that of other children of a similar age without SEND.

Click here to view the Full Short Breaks Eligibility Document (Opens in New Window)

Click here to go back to the short breaks landing page

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Need help?

0800 0345 340 option 5

SENDLocalOffer@Barnsley.gov.uk

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