A long story short I started running back in the beginning of 2021 as my love of sweets and crisps had started to take its toll and I decided that the one hour a day of outside time Boris gave us during covid I was going to use to get back into some sort of shape. I started doing 3km a day and slowly increased it week on week as I began to get fitter.

Three years on I am going to do my first marathon on 20th October in York. I have this year done a handful of 30km runs and each time I finish I say to myself there is no way I can do another 12km to get up to a marathon distance so we will have to see if I can actually achieve it

I have decided to raise money for an organisation very close to my heart which is SENDiass4BCP who provide free, impartial, and confidential information, advice and support for children and young people (up to the age of 25) with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND), and their parents/carers, living in Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole.

The above paragraph taken from their website does not do them justice. They are a lifeline to families who have children with SEND. From my personal experience they have helped my family with several challenges. The first was to ensure Zac can be taught in a class a year below his chronological ago which was a huge challenge for us despite Zac being born very late in the school year and having a development level of a child much younger than him. The second huge challenge was securing an EHCP (educational health child plan) for Zac which is a legal document which states what support a child needs. The most recent challenge we had was to ensure that Zac’s EHCP provides the right support which sounds obvious but was a huge battle but with help from Rebecca from SENDiass4BCP we managed to achieve this and we finally are happy with the help and support we are getting and Zac is now flourishing in and outside of school.

Before we had Zac I always thought people with disabilities would just be given the support and help they need, unfortunately it is the complete opposite and they have to fight for everything which is why I assume SENDiass4BCP was created in the first place.

SENDiass4BCP only have 10 members of staff of which 7 are fully time and they service the whole of Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole supporting around 2,000 families in 2023-24 directly and an additional 5,000 with resources and their website.

In order to show my appreciation to SENDiass4BCP I would like to try and raise as much money as I can as I truly believe without their help Zac’s school life would be a truly awful experience and quite possibly would end up him being removed from mainstream schooling.

In summary if you wish to support an organisation who provides a lifeline to children and young people with additional needs and their parents please donate, even if it’s a couple of quid!

Thanks

Thomas Simpkin