“What sort of person ought I to be?” – Repositioning EPs in light of the Children and Families Bill (2013)

Abstract

The changes brought by the Special Educational Needs and Disability (SEND) code of practice: 0 to 25 years, 2014, is an opportunity for educational psychologists (EPs) to reposition ourselves so that we can improve our contribution to the services for children and young people with special educational needs (SENs) or a disability. Underpinning such a repositioning is a reaffirmation of our core moral principles of promoting autonomy, beneficence, nonmaleficence and social justice. Taking up a new position is difficult. However one way of thinking about it is reminding ourselves of our values. Values underpin our morality and interact with a person’s character (virtue). Socrates’ famous rhetorical questions remains unanswered for EPs “what sort of person ought I to be?” The purposes of this article is to draw attention to the moral principles that could underpin our work with the new code and lead us to build our practice around advocacy, practice based evidence and a social model of disability

Keywords:

• SEND code of practice
• moral principles
• advocacy
• practice based evidence
• social model of disability