How IPSEA has dramatically changed one little boy's life

When the brown envelope landed on the doormat with the tribunal’s decision, Sunita* couldn’t bring herself to open it. Her family held their breath, waiting for the news that could transform life for her four-year-old son Rajan. “We had won! I felt such relief.”

The single mother bringing up three children in a rented home after fleeing a violent marriage says IPSEA was her “lifeline” as she fought for the best education for her autistic son. “I couldn’t have done it without them.”

Rajan had been a premature baby. “When he was diagnosed with severe autism at the age of two and half, I tried to be brave, but I knew that the world had changed for ever for us.”

When Sunita moved to be close to her family, Rajan’s statement was amended to name his new school – one for children with severe learning difficulties. In this school, Rajan was the only autistic, mobile child. “Within a week I knew my son was in the wrong place. It lacked the focus and attention on autism that I knew was best for him. ”

When Rajan had been a pupil at the school for a year, Sunita appealed against his statement. Her first choice of school for Rajan was a specialist school for autistic children aged four to 19.

With IPSEA’s support, she won a place for Rajan at the specialist school. Rajan has been there since September 2008 and is doing “fantastically”. “The staff communicate with me and they are already potty-training him. I didn’t know that I have rights as a parent and that there is legislation out there to protect us. I can’t do justice to IPSEA with the words ‘thank you’. My little boy’s life is dramatically better.”

*Names have been changed