Jo 

Jo is a Highly Specialist Chartered Clinical Psychologist, qualifying in 2003 and working in a CAMHS team from then until 2014.  She has worked at Meadows since 2008 and currently works with us two days a week. 

Jo develops a Well-Being Plan for every student by coordinating all the ‘targeted’ interventions a student needs when they join the school. In addition, she uses the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire to measure the students’ well-being and can do a classroom observation to see how their mental health may be impacting their functioning.  Jo usually attends New Student Progress Reviews to share the Well-being Plan with the students, families and key staff.

Jo offers 1-2-1 psychology sessions and can co-facilitate group work. She draws on a range of psychological models so that the intervention can be tailored to each student and their needs. The length of the intervention can be short, medium or long term.  Students are usually referred via the EHCP and referrals from the Link Worker, Key Stage Manager or by the student themself can also be considered.

Jo regularly meets with other clinicians in the well-being team to support the work they are doing and monitor the progress of the interventions. She ensures effective strategies are shared with key staff and families and that ongoing areas of need are highlighted for further support.

Jo attends ‘Team around the Child’ systemic meetings to offer a psychological perspective to inform understandings about, and strategies for the students. She offers consultation and training to school staff about mental health and resilience.

Jo provides risk triage and/or advises care pathways when a student has hurt themselves on purpose or has thoughts of wanting to end their lives.

She liaises with external agencies to ensure joined up health care between school and other health care providers.

Jo is registered with the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC). She is member of the British Psychological Society (BPS).  She is DBS checked to 'enhanced' level.

Sue 

Sue works within the well-being team as a counsellor. She is with us two mornings a week. She offers three sessions for individual student counselling. Students may be referred by their EHCP, link worker, key stage lead or by themselves. Counselling can be short or long term, based on the needs of the student.   

She also runs our emotional literacy and social skills group called Choices.  The group is co-facilitated by a member of school staff and has up to six students in it.  Students can access this for as long as they feel they need to.  Should a young person be offered either of these services, we will always inform the family (usually via the link worker). We will seek parental consent if we feel the young person is unable to give/not give this themselves. 

Sue also offers family support sessions to enable people at home to support the young person. This is offered at key stage 2 (as research suggests working with families is more effective than offering direct work to a young person of this age) or when a young person is felt to need support but does not want to access this themselves. Families can choose if they access this support in person or via the telephone; they can choose how often to have sessions and they can decide when to end these sessions. 

Sue provides training to staff as well as staff support sessions. Outside of Meadows, Sue provides training and supervision to other counsellors and school staff.

Sue works for Time2Talk, Children, Adolescents & Family Counselling Service. She has over 20 years' experience working with young people and families and has worked in clinic-based settings and other educational settings.  

Sue is an accredited member of the British Association of Counsellors and Psychotherapists. She is DBS checked to 'enhanced' level. 

Helen 

Helen is a qualified Speech and Language Therapist who is registered with the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC) and the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists (RCSLT). Before joining Meadows school, Helen supported children with a wide range of speech, language and communication needs across preschool/nursery settings, mainstream primary schools and special primary and secondary schools. In this role she worked with a variety of speech and language diagnoses including Voice Disorders, Stammering, Selective Mutism and Social Communication Disorders. Helen enjoys working as part of a successful multi-disciplinary team, establishing good working relationships with parents/carers, school staff and other professionals to guide and support their knowledge and skills.

Natalie

Natalie qualified as a Speech and Language Therapist in 2006 and is registered with both the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists (RCSLT) and the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC). Before joining Meadows School, Natalie worked across London and Kent in a range of different specialisms and treated individuals of all ages with speech and language difficulties. At Meadows School, Natalie works with both primary and secondary-aged students. Her role includes informal and formal communication assessment, providing 1:1 or group therapy for targeted communication difficulties, and working with teachers and the multi-disciplinary team to ensure how to best support pupils' communication skills in the classroom. A large area of Natalie's work focusses on supporting pupils develop their social communication skills and transferring these into school life to help aid learning and friendships.

 

Tina

Tina qualified in 1999 from the School of Occupational Therapy in Copenhagen, Denmark and has worked in England since qualification. She has worked for many years in adult mental health, acute, forensic and community settings. She has held a number of leadership roles within the National Health Service and jointly worked on many service development initiatives including setting up an in-patient service for adults with autism and learning disability in the capacity as an operational manager. She has supervised colleagues from various disciplines, students and lead occupational therapy teams.

Tina started specialising in learning disability and autism in 2006 and has worked within this field since. She specialises as in occupational coaching, sensory integration and primitive reflexes which means focusing on a range of behaviours which may be an outcome of sensory processing difficulties and motor coordination difficulties which can cause barriers to learning and development. She focuses on the need of the child and how the needs can be met within the context of family life and school environments. She is also skilled in delivering teaching and training for families, school staff and other professionals.

Tina has completed her postgraduate training in Sensory Integration Training and is currently completing her advanced practitioner qualification. She is trained in the Assessment of Process and Motor skills (AMPS); she has completed Rhythmic Movement Therapy (RMT) for primitive reflexes and Quickshift music training.

Tina has also completed the Autism Diagnostic Observation Screening (ADOS) and is part of a larger team who assess and diagnose children with complex challenges in relation to ASD.