Many LAs now use the e-PEPs online system that is secure and has a number of benefits for tracking progress over time as well as being mainly paperless.
The social worker and the school’s Designated Teacher are the professionals responsible for collating information for a PEP.
The following is advice from Welfare Call, an organisation that a number of LAs use to manage ePEPS and attendance data. The key question is ‘who requires a copy of this PEP?’ or words to that effect at the point of logging contributors.
The social worker is responsible for collecting the child’s and the carer’s views to input onto the ePEP.
The social worker and the virtual school contact are responsible for ensuring that the carer is a person who requires a copy.
It is not common practice for carers to be given direct access to an ePEP online portal.
1. Carers and SSWs should check with their child/children’s social worker and ensure that they are on the ePEP system as a person who requires a copy.
2. Put the request in an email and let the social worker know carers have received advice about this from Welfare Call via the Compass Education Service.
3. Virtual schools in each local authority (England only) often have an ePEP Coordinator who arranges access permissions etc. Get in contact with this professional (in the placing authority virtual school team) to ask about receiving a copy.
4. The ePEP Coordinator can forward the PEP outcomes to them as a PDF but it has to be sent securely using encryption such as Egress/Switch (free and easy to sign up for once an Egress/Switch email is received).
5. The ePEP Coordinator might refer carers back to the social worker. If that is the case, then ‘cc’ them into the request to the social worker.
6. Contact details for virtual schools can be found using an online search e.g. ‘Buckinghamshire virtual school’.
7. If an ePEP Coordinator role does not exist/cannot be found, get in touch with the named virtual school contact.
8. If it helps, let the virtual school know we’ve received advice from Welfare Call that including carers is a straightforward process.
At School Level
The Designated Teacher is also able to access any PEPs (including ePEPs) and is responsible for collating teachers’ views and attainment data but does not usually have permission to download and send a PDF version to a carer. It is always worth checking with them though.
