Information for schools receiving the School High Health Needs Fund (SHHNF)

Schools can learn about receiving the School High Health Needs Fund (SHHNF) and what their responsibilities are for the management and use of the funding.

When their student is assisted by the School High Health Needs Fund, there are certain processes that a school must follow to manage the funding.

• Beginning to use the SHHNF
• About Individual Care Plans
• Records
• Your school’s responsibilities
• Reviewing SHHNF

Beginning to use the SHHNF

Now that eligibility is confirmed, your school should make contact with the local Ministry of Education office.

A Service Manager will allocate a key contact person whose role is to support you through the initial development of the Individual Care Plan (ICP) and to be your point of contact.

The student’s family/whānau will need to be consulted about the level of support provided based on the information in the ICP. High Health funding levels for students eligible for the fund may alter when further Care Plans are developed, or if the student’s level of need changes significantly.

About Individual Care Plans

The ICP will detail:

• a brief summary of the student’s health needs
• the care and supervision tasks the support person completes, how long each task takes and how many times a day and week the tasks are completed
• what tasks the student can do independently and what tasks the student needs help with
• a brief summary of the plans and strategies the school has in place to help the student develop independence, if appropriate
• the monitoring system that will ensure the care remains appropriate to the student’s needs during the year
• the evaluation process that will determine the student’s ongoing level of need for care and supervision, together with information about the student’s progress towards being able to manage their own needs
• signatures of parent/caregiver and the educator.

Records

It is essential your school immediately starts recording and maintaining accurate information about the daily care and supervision provided to the student.

The records:

• should include any instances the support person has had to intervene to prevent an incident or following an incident
• should be provided at the time of the student’s review
• help to give the verifiers a good overview of the student’s health needs.

Your school’s responsibilities

SHHNF supports the care of students with high health needs and should be targeted to those times of the school day where that care is most needed. Support is based on the:

• latest ICP, and
• student attending school full-time.

Reviewing SHHNF

A student’s health needs may be ongoing but what may change over time is their ability to self-manage their health needs.

Each student in the fund is reviewed regularly by Ministry of Education verifiers. The verifiers will request:

• the current ICP
• a recent medical report
• any current relevant information not covered in the ICP
• information about the student’s progress towards independence
• copies of records from the last term.

The documents will assist the verifiers to determine whether the student continues to meet the SHHNF criteria.

Last reviewed: 30 March 2021 Has this been useful? Give us your feedback