It is clear that the number of Support Staff in schools has increased rapidly in the last few years. Schools and Local Authorities have responded by providing much greater training and focus on all Support Staff, particularly HLTAs (higher level teaching assistants) and TAs.
Helping people to keep their voices healthy and communicate effectively
There were over 30 Papers presented over the 2 very full days, from a range of UK and International specialists. Individual morning and afternoon sessions were chaired by well known and much respected people - John Rubin and Jan Svec, as well as Dr.Ruth Epstein and Philippa Ratcliffe from The Royal National Throat, Nose and Ear Hospital.
The inspiration behind the Symposium was Dr Ruth Epstein, Head of Speech and Language Therapy Services at the Royal. 
Dr.Lesley Hendy gave an excellent summary to the delegates of the current background that faces teaching staff. Whilst they have always been seen to be at 'higher risk' - the main reason for Roz starting the VCN over 15 years ago!
Classrooms of Sweyne Park School in Essex have been transformed. Hearing impaired students work with main stream pupils so the school is designated as a resourced school for hearing impaired pupils. It is also a Specialist Science Centre.
Two in five NQTs desert the classroom because of workload and pupils' indiscipline, GTC survey finds (Article from a recent TES). The first major survey into why huge numbers of new teachers quit the profession has revealed that they are driven out by badly behaved pupils and heavy workloads.
Noise can be bad for pupils and teachers, but architects put style over learning, says Bridget Shield, who gave a fascinating paper at our recent Spring Study Day and this article in a recent copy of TES.