Clinical & Support Services
Welcome to West Kirby School Support Services
"The collective vision and drive to provide a school which meets pupils' holistic needs results in pupils' exceptional progress" Ofsted 2016
All Support Services are an intrinsic part to pupils' education at West Kirby School and College; integrated across the school and Residential Care provision, this provides valuable support to enable our pupils' learning, development and success.
- Occupational Therapy
- Speech and Language Therapy
- Clinical Psychologist
- Pastoral Care Team
- Learning Support
- Medical Team
- SENDCo Team
- Home School Liaison
Internal referral system and Support Services panel
At West Kirby School and College we operate dynamic support for our young people through our internal referral system. Pupils can be referred internally for additional support; this is taken to our panel meeting for discussion and the appropriate team is identified for interventions.
Introduction to our teams
Our Occupational Therapy team support our pupils' sensory needs and emotional regulation. They provide individual assessments and develop personalised support plans for sensory motor skills, with the aim of developing skills progression; delivered school wide and through direct 1:1 sessions in our OT suite. Our Occupational Therapy suite, opened in 2018, allows our young people to address sensory, motor and proprioceptive skills on-site as a foundation to their learning.
Our Speech and Language Therapy team (SaLT) offers a range of assessment and therapy interventions, strategies, training and advice. This is all provided through highly individualised programmes and resources, according to need. SaLT is delivered by our Therapists as 1:1 sessions, small group and whole class sessions.
Our Clinical Psychologist, Dr Ze’ev Levita has extensive experience in his specialist field and provides support and advice to staff, parents and pupils. He provides training to staff in school and his parent/carer workshops are extremely popular and easily accessible.
Team around the child - Our Clinical Psychologist, Dr Ze’ev Levita, is available to provide advice and suggest strategies to the staff working with pupils.
Pastoral Care team -At West Kirby School and College, our Pastoral Care Team support our pupil’s physical, social and emotional welfare, building positive relationships that allow us to identify and support behaviours which impact on a pupils ability to access learning. In turn, supporting the pupils to be able to self-regulate in the difficult situations life can present.
Our staff have specific training and experience in Attachment and Trauma . They support and help our young people develop emotional regulation and well-being through specific programmes and interventions.
Also part of this team, staff are specialists in Positive Behaviour Support, Diffusion and De-escalation and Risk Assessments. They work with the education staff and provide valuable support for the wellbeing and safety our pupils; also providing specialist regular staff training staff across the school.
Our Learning Support team are an integral part of the education team. This includes a Reading Support team and Learning Mentors.
Our Home School Liaison Officer/Deputy Safeguarding Lead Mrs Lynda Powner, plays a pivotal role of additional and on-going support for pupils within the school. She has strong positive relationships with external professionals and works in close partnership with agencies, parents/carers and pupils to support and achieve best outcomes for all. She also plays a key role in the Admissions process and promoting high levels of Attendance.
As a school we have own Medical team led by the School Nurse, based in a well equipped medical suite, who provide a range of medical services working with pupils and staff, including managing medicines and liaising with external health professionals.