Short breaks – engagement with families

Short breaks are play and leisure opportunities which support disabled children to go places, spend time with friends, take part in fun and enjoyable activities, develop their independence and try new things. They could be in the family home, at an activity, in the community or other residential setting. A short break gives parents, carers and families a chance to have time out and rest from caring responsibilities.

During term time, they are typically not delivered during core school hours. The type, length and duration of a short break will vary depending on the individual needs, following an assessment of the child or young person and their family.

They can last anything from a couple of hours to an evening, overnight, weekend and can be offered during daytimes, evenings, weekends and school holidays. This provides disabled children and young people with opportunities to take part in unforgettable activities and develop vital skills now and for their future, as they become more independent and form friendships outside of their family.

Here’s our updated short breaks statement – Understanding short breaks.

Different types of short breaks

• Universal services and activities: These are clubs, groups or services that are open to all children and young people, both with and without a disability. They are services that are accessible to anyone at any time.
• Universal+ services: These ‘targeted help’ services are services that, typically, parents and carers can access directly for their child or young person. They will be aimed at supporting children who have a disability or special educational needs.
• Targeted support: These are services that have been assessed by the Council as being needed in order to meet unmet and eligible social care needs. They may be services which are currently not accessible without direct involvement from the Council.
• Specialist services or individual support: These are services that can be accessed via an assessment of your child or young person’s needs, carried out by the Council. These services are for children and young people whose needs cannot be fully met through universal and/or targeted services.

In the summer of 2019, we organised workshops with the Parent Carer Forum Devon (PCFD) to find out what people think of short breaks in Devon. Families were able to engage in a number of ways that worked best for them, including workshops, parent carer groups’ own coffee mornings, or evening get-togethers, one to one phone calls, via email, or face to face discussions.

We then wrote to more than 1,600 families in Autumn 2020 to provide feedback via an online survey, to which we received 176 responses. We held 10 workshops in early 2020; a further nine coffee mornings; and attended wider parent carer groups. Some parents and carers also engaged and offered their feedback through one-to-one communication. We held four workshops for providers of short break services in December and January 2020, and these were attended by over 46 representatives from across 35 short break services.

We had to pause the engagement during the COVID-19 pandemic, but we undertook a further online survey in 2021, receiving feedback from 146 individuals; and there was then a series of coffee morning throughout 2022. We worked with individual families through reviews to develop greater understanding of what was working, what needed to change and how we could better support our families.

We re-energised our ongoing engagement in 2025, with our children and families and created SEND Family Fun Days as part our journey to update our understanding and knowledge of what matters to our children, young people and families. We also engaged with current and potential short breaks providers.

Initial engagement provided key themes such as:

• Accessibility
• Opportunities for family time
• Enjoying outdoor experiences
• Building confident to try new things, attend activities and new places

In response to the feedback we received, initiatives such as the Outdoor Explorer Club and accompanying leaflet, Family Fun Days, and the SEND Tor Pilots were developed in collaboration with our Champions for Change.

These ideas reflect the voices of children, young people, and their families, and mark an important step forward as we continue broader engagement with families around the short breaks offer.

As part of our work to keep our provision of short breaks under review:

• We undertook an initial needs assessment of the current short breaks offer, considering those who access support or may in the future to develop understanding.
• This has helped us to start to understand consider if the current provision is sufficient, identifying some of the gaps and challenges for families accessing support within our current model.
• At the heart of this work is the need to carefully consider the impact of any changes on our children, young people and families.

We recognise that the number of children with Education, Health, and Care Plans (EHCPs) or receiving Special Educational Needs (SEN) support is increasing every year.

We need to assure ourselves that they have enough and can access to the right services and support by hearing about what matters to our children, young people and families.

We are committed to ensuring that any changes we make will align with the commissioning intentions that were co-produced in 2022 and our Four Cornerstones approach.

Some learning from our needs assessment, and direct feedback from our families, young people through community days and questionnaire:

• The community offer for those with neurodivergent needs is a significant area of need, along with age-appropriate activities as children and young people move on their journey toward adulthood.
• Families struggle to find out about activities in their local area, which can be complicated due to their geographical location, and these activities can vary in cost significantly.
• Families do not always know who to ask for help and find navigating our systems complicated and frustrating.
• Many have talked about the need for clear information, instruction and communication early to reduce anxieties, helping them feel welcomed and cared for.
• Choice, group size and flexible start and end times were identified as areas for exploration.
• Routine is important to our families. This needs to be considered within any offer, recognising the impact of change and transitions.
• Many families identified activities they would like to do in their community, or as part of a group supporting peer learning and development while connecting our parents and carers with those who have similar experiences.

We know that there are areas of our short breaks which work well for some families, but this is not consistent and does not provide the choice and flexibility we would like for our children and young people. We understand that we need to strengthen our community-based activities, so that our families are not reliant of assessments and specialist services, allowing them to access this support earlier.

To make our vision a reality we are proposing to:

• Support universal activity development within our communities, which are accessible to all families.
• Develop a ‘Universal+’ offer which can be accessed early and without the need for further assessment.
• Commission short breaks for those who have a need for targeted or specialist short breaks.
• Develop the current market which provides many children and young people with one-to-one support, or above.

Through our work we will see more families accessing support earlier and before their needs increase, both through short breaks and direct intervention. This will increase the short breaks market, adding choice and options for families and increasing quality. We will see a rebalancing of how we use our resources, to develop our graduated short breaks offer.

We know how important it is to understand the needs and what matters to our disabled children and young people with special educational needs. To gain these views of children and young people we will continue to work with them and partners.

Once this engagement ends, we will:

• review our needs assessment to consider if this needs changing or updating based on your feedback
• consider the impact on you, your children and young people of what we are proposing
• update our ‘Short Break Strategy’ which will be our plan moving forwards

We take accessibility seriously and recognise that some of the information presented in the files available on this page may not be fully accessible to someone using assistive technology such as a screen reader.

If you need guidance or an alternative format, email childrenscommissioningsecure-mailbox@devon.gov.uk with details of any preferred format and the assistive technology you use.