Hospital and Outreach Education (HOE) is a Pupil Referral Unit which provides educational support for children and young people with complex medical and/or mental health needs which prevent them from attending school full time. It covers the whole of Northamptonshire and is organised structurally into three ‘mini teams’ which cover the North and South of the county and the Child and Adolescent Mental Health (CAMHs) Units respectively.
The HOE team is led by Cath Kitchen and is made up of qualified teachers, senior learning support assistants, higher level teaching assistants, family liaison workers and a team of business support led by a school business manager. All staff are appropriately trained and employ a broad range of skills and engagement techniques to help children and young people recognise and celebrate their strengths, overcome their difficulties, cope with their medical/mental health condition, and re-engage with life-long learning.
HOE provides direct teaching and support with reintegration back to school and/or support across the transition, as well as supporting school improvement by offering advice and guidance to schools on how particular medical and mental health conditions may impact on a pupil’s behaviour, attendance, achievement and attainment.
HOE support is rather like a ‘revolving door’. Pupils are admitted for support, spend some time in the ‘revolving door’ then go out the other side back to school or post 16 provider when they are well enough.
Need more information on how we can help?
Pupils, parents/carers, staff, management committee and other stakeholders were all consulted when agreeing our mission statement which sets out our vision:
‘To provide access to appropriate education for all children and young people with medical and mental health needs, keeping education alive in the pupil’s life, maintaining progress and enabling them to achieve their potential’
We are committed to developing our provision in collaboration with our stakeholders and schools to ensure that we are able to meet the ever changing needs of those young people who have medical and/or mental health difficulties which make attending mainstream school a challenge.