What is a peripatetic SENCO?

The definition

A peripatetic SENCO is a qualified teacher who works across several schools as their shared special educational needs co-ordinator. The SEND Code of Practice allows this, mainly for smaller primaries. "Peripatetic" just means travelling between sites, rather than being based at one. It is a practitioner term, not a phrase used in the SEND Code itself. What the Code does describe is the same thing under a plainer name: a shared SENCO, employed to work across more than one school.

What the SEND Code actually says

The shared, or peripatetic, arrangement sits in the SEND Code of Practice (2015) at paragraphs 6.92 to 6.94. The Code says it may be appropriate for a number of smaller primary schools to share a SENCO employed to work across them, as long as each school secures enough time away from teaching, and enough administrative support, for the SENCO to do the job for the total registered pupil population across all the schools involved. The time and support are sized to the combined number of pupils, not to one school in isolation.

The Code attaches two further conditions. A shared SENCO should not normally have a significant class-teaching commitment, and the role should not be carried out by a headteacher at one of the schools. Both conditions protect the standing and the time the postholder needs to run SEN strategically across sites, rather than firefighting one timetable.

The conditions at a glance

• Who it is for: mainly a group of smaller primary schools, not a one-size rule for every setting.
• Time and admin: each school must fund enough non-contact time and admin support for the whole pupil population across all the schools.
• Teaching load: no significant class-teaching commitment.
• Who cannot hold it: not a headteacher at one of the schools.
• Review: schools must check the arrangement is working and stop it if SEN provision suffers.

The qualification rules still apply in full

Being peripatetic changes nothing about the standard of the postholder. A shared SENCO must be a qualified teacher and meet every other requirement in the Code. A newly appointed SENCO who has not previously been a SENCO for 12 months or more must gain the relevant qualification within three years of appointment. Since 1 September 2024 that qualification is the NPQ SENCO (the National Professional Qualification for SENCOs), which replaced the older NASENCO award. The three-year clock and the qualified-teacher rule apply to a peripatetic SENCO exactly as they would to a full-time one.

Why the qualifier matters for your child or your school

The detail most generic guides miss is that the named SENCO is still the statutory point of contact for SEN at each school, regardless of being shared. A parent told their school shares its SENCO has not lost the SENCO; they have a named co-ordinator who also covers another site. For a school leader or governor weighing a shared post across a federation or trust, the arrangement is compliant only if it meets the Code's conditions: a head cannot double up as the shared SENCO, the time must be funded for the combined roll, and the federation must review whether the SENCO can actually deliver the role across every site.

This page is general information, not clinical or legal advice.

This page is general information, not clinical or legal advice.