Listen in on an important conversation on the ongoing crisis in Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) support. What support is available, what is working and what needs to change?
Our panel: Laura Hughes from MoorVision, Gillian Doherty from Special Needs Jungle and Josie Grainger‑Francova RSBC, explored the reality of the crisis and shared their lived experiences working in this space. They dived into the importance of proper SEND support, the challenges the sector is facing, and what the future has in store.
This webinar took place on Thursday 6 November 2025. A recording of the event is below.
Watch the recording here
"We are particularly concerned about children and young people with VI as evidence shows that they are very heavily disadvantaged in their life opportunities because of a lack of support in educational settings."
About the speakers
Laura Hughes
Laura Hughes is the Founder and CEO of MoorVision, setting the charity up after becoming a parent to a child with vision impairment and using her own experiences of helping her child navigate the world of vision impairment across education, health, accessing sport and becoming independent. Her daughter, now 27, is one of the UK’s few visually impaired doctors.
MoorVision provides information, advice, support, advocacy, training, activities and residential opportunities to families of children and young people with vision impairment aged 0-29 throughout Devon and Cornwall across all areas of their lives.
With just 5 members of staff and a large rural area to cover, MoorVision punch well above their weight with a strong focus on delivery and outcomes at all times, transforming the lives of hundreds of children and young people in the South-West.
Josie Grainger‑Francova
Josie Grainger-Francova is the Education Director for the Royal Society for Blind Children (RSBC). She is also the Executive Principal for Dorton College, RSBC's post 16 education offer. Dorton College offers a unique hybrid educations offer, combining inclusive mainstream education access with VI support and specialist VI education.
Having recently opened a VI Centre of Excellence in Surrey as part of the Dorton College offer, Josie's focus is identifying national areas of VI education need with the intention to open further VI Centres of Excellence. Josie has just finished her Doctorate studying the lived experiences of VI students in education.
Gillian Doherty
Gillian is the parent of a young person with Down’s syndrome and co-director of Special Needs Jungle (SNJ), a parent-led volunteer organisation providing SEND news, resources and strategic advocacy. SNJ are co-founders of the Save Our Children’s Rights campaign.
Gillian represents SNJ in the Disabled Children’s Partnership and the Special Education Consortium. She also serves on the national SEND Strategic Oversight Board and chairs Ups and Downs Southwest, a charity supporting families of children with Down’s syndrome.
"The SEND crisis is not just an important issue, it is a critical issue, it involves often highly vulnerable young people who may not have equity of access the education they deserve."
Who will benefit from this webinar?
The session will interest:
- Parents, guardians and families of children with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities
- Educators, teachers and individuals involved in education space
- Organisations and individuals in the sight loss sector
- Anyone interested in understanding SEND education and what support they can seek
