Consultancy for education settings
I work with settings ready to be rights respecting, not just compliant.
For nurseries, schools, colleges and alternative provision. There is a significant difference between a setting that has ticked the SEND boxes and one that has genuinely redesigned how it thinks, teaches and operates. I work with the latter, and I help the former become it.
What I offer
Whole setting neuroinclusion audit
The full picture
A review of your policies, practice, physical environment, communication systems, curriculum design and culture, assessed against the SEND Code of Practice 2015, the Equality Act 2010 and the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. You receive a written report with prioritised recommendations and a realistic action plan.
SEND and Equality Act review
Focused, and often urgent
A close look at your current SEND offer, your EHCP support and your Equality Act duties, including policies, provision maps and any live or emerging issue. Particularly useful ahead of inspection, or where a concern has already been raised.
Staff training, built for your setting
In depth, and it counts towards your team's CPD
Designed for your staff and your children rather than taken off a shelf. Neuroinclusion, PDA, autism and ADHD in the classroom, the Equality Act 2010, rights based practice, EHCP processes and co-regulation. Half day, full day, or a programme across several sessions.
Mock inspection, SEND focus
Before somebody else does it
A pre inspection review of your SEND leadership and provision, conducted against the inspection framework, with full written feedback and a verbal debrief with your SENCO and senior leadership team.
Strategic consultancy for leadership
Longer term
Advisory work with leadership teams who want neuroinclusion in the DNA of the setting rather than bolted to the side of it. Board and leadership briefings, policy co-design, and ongoing advice.
I am not commenting from the outside.Yasmin A Darling
Why this is different
I have run the setting, not only advised one.
I founded and directed Maisie Poppins in Hackney, graded Outstanding by Ofsted twice, built on The Maisie Poppins Way and later The Freedom Approach, two pedagogies I developed over a decade of direct practice. Over thirty staff, up to seventy two children a day, and a keyworker setting throughout the pandemic, in one of the most diverse boroughs in the country.
I know what it takes to run a genuinely inclusive setting because I have done it, at scale, under pressure. I bring that operational knowledge into every commission.
“The best training I have received in 23 years of teaching.”
Sarah Dowie, teacher
Named client work
The Forward Trust, April 2023
The M-PACT Neurodiversity Project. A full audit and redesign of a national family programme, commissioned by their Head of Families and Young People, with a social impact report attached.
Hackney childminder network, 2013
Training delivered across the borough's childminder network, signed off by the then Mayor of Hackney.
Famly
Named Early Years Expert and content contributor. Commissioned and paid webinars and articles for an international early years platform.
Addiction Professionals
Webinars and conference workshops on neurodivergence for the national charity.
Starting
A free thirty minute call, and no obligation after it.
A conversation about what you actually need, and an honest answer about whether I am the right person for it.