The Greenwich Sensory Service  

The Royal Greenwich Sensory Service provides support to deaf and visually impaired young people at Rowan Wood School. A qualified teacher of the vision impaired visits regularly, and a qualified teacher of the deaf is usually on site each week. The support for each child will be agreed in consultation and varies according to their sensory needs.   

Queen Elizabeth Hospital  

Queen Elizabeth is our local hospital and so we are pleased to have been able to offer a visit and advice to the team running the hospital school.  We run a series of bespoke training sessions to help the team at the hospital get to know our children and their needs better.  

Oxleas Health Trust  

Oxleas are commissioned to provide services to the school which include physiotherapy and occupational therapy, speech therapy, and nursing services.  We have a high standard of collaborative working at Willow Dene and this is achieved by encouraging input from our Oxleas team at all levels in the day to day running of the school.  This has allowed us to offer innovative opportunities such as presentation mornings for professionals which explain our model of working and bespoke training days for staff.  Our model of practice has impacted on the learning environment at the school with several ground-breaking health and education partnership projects, such as our Medi Motion bikes and our interactive floor tracking impacting positively on achievement.  The development of the service at Compass Special Schools was discussed at the National Music Therapy Conference in 2018  

Goldsmiths University  

We work closely with Goldsmiths University to provide guest lectures and workshops to their PGCE students. These opportunities provide students with an understanding of SEND and the provisions that are in place to support our children. These are followed up with an opportunity for students to do a one-day placement at Willow Dene, to see this theory in practice and to consolidate their understanding. We have always had fantastic feedback from the staff and students at Goldsmiths. In addition, we work closely with Goldsmiths on the Schools Direct PGCE Programme and provide a talent pool of newly qualified teachers for Compass Special Schools to begin their career via this route into teaching.