Janet O'Keefe, Speech and Language Therapist

Established 2011 by Janet O’Keefe and Robert Ashton

The benefits of being a member are:

• A professional entry on an excellent website easily accessible to parents, other professionals and potential referrers
• An office staff dedicated to helping you find clients and contracts to keep you busy providing therapy, teaching or other support services
• Regular CPD, support and supervision opportunities
• Back office facilities and services such as virtual secretarial services and telephone answering reception services

The benefits of contracting with a Clarity member professional or group of professionals to provide a service you need is:

• A one stop shop to find people in your geographical location who have the skills you need rather than having to go to many different websites and organisations to find your team
• All basic checks will have been done and references taken up so that the contract can be started immediately without delay
• Services such as insurance and CPD can be provided to the member

The benefits to parents and children with SEN are:

• A clear, easy to use website to find information relevant to your childs needs and professionals with the skills to provide the services your child needs including legal advice
• Funding may be available to help with the cost of funding services directly or support and training from the Foundation to help your school or local community find a creative way to provide what your child needs
• An organisation that listens to your needs and tries to find solutions to support you and your child reach their educational and life outcomes

Do come to the Towards a Positive Future Conference on 14-15 October 2011 and help shape what Clarity will be for its members and users.

The membership will attract recommendation by client review, evidence of CPD, and professional references which will enable those fund holders or clients to find easily those members or groups of members in their geographical locations to fulfill contracts and provide much needed services to children with SEN.

We will ensure that all members have jumped through the appropriate hoops of insurance, CRB and CPD training and be able to provide all appropriate back office support so that clinicians can concentrate on the provision of therapy, teaching or training being contracted.

Members will be able to buy into the level of support that they need to work as efficiently as possible. It is not a gatekeeper, professionals will still need to belong to their profession specific organisations and membership is voluntary. The details are not set in stone which is why we are inviting prospective members to be part of Clarity’s evolution. There will be an annual membership fee. In order to join people will need to prove they are who they say they are and be checked out. The membership fee will cover an excellent website, and an office staff who are dedicated to providing services to and for the members, encouraging and supporting networking, sharing skills and knowledge and promoting members to the public and fund holders/potential referrers. It will also provide a range of services which members may find helpful to them in running and developing their business.

It will be a social enterprise and any profit made on selling these services to members will go into a fund to pay for services or support projects for those individuals or groups who may not be able to get funding elsewhere. If members need a CRB we could be an organisation to apply for one, if members need insurance then we could provide it and if support or supervision is required then this could be facilitated. It needs to be flexible because each professional group will have different needs. We will encourage everyone who wants to to join. The only differentiation will be that website profiles can be enhanced by online recommendations and reviews and references along the lines of social networking sites but we would do our best to ensure that all reviews are genuine as many are posted falsely which is not helpful.

Potential referrers will continue to seek tenders from a range of providers but our network will actively seek potential contracts on behalf of members and help with the paperwork so that our members are represented in as many tenders as possible. There are many, many other ideas and support services which the network could provide to members at a cost accessible by sole traders, charities, support groups and small businesses. It will grow and evolve as the membership grows.

It will be UK wide for the network and membership. There will be an advertising and marketing strategy through local and national networking, direct contact with prospective referrers, talks, local and national media and website optimisation. Members will only stay members quite rightly if the organisation provides real measurable benefits to them as individuals, their business, their clients and the wider community. It aims to be both creative and innovative in finding ways that services can be provided and paid for in the current economic climate. All ideas to improve from the membership or other stakeholders will be listened to.

Make sure you book your place at the conference today. We look forward to working with you on this exciting future journey…