Welcome to the Bottom Line, Erica

by Rebecca Thomas

Hoops

Being a SENCO, Erica — do you even know what that is?

And if you do… what does it mean to you?

“I didn’t ask for this.”

My son’s favourite line — delivered with absolute conviction — came the day we discovered his homework tucked neatly into the curtain by the front door. A masterstroke, really… insulation meets avoidance.

When your brain runs on an ADHD current, sometimes the quickest solution isn’t doing the task — it’s relocating the problem.

As adults, we probably didn’t ‘ask for that’ either.

And yet — here we are.

We’ve already established I work in the kind of school you seem to despise, Erica.

The kind that says yes.

To everyone.

Newsflash.

I’m the SENCO there.

Confession: Never been one before.

If I’m honest, I avoided it. I knew — deep down — that if I stepped into this space, I’d see the system up close. No filters. No polite summaries. Just the raw edges.

And now I’m here.

Yes.

The system is f***ed.

What I didn’t expect was the way it follows you home.

This role sits with you.

It eats dinner beside you.

Tonight, it’s been three… maybe four hours… trying to wrap my head around an ORS application for a child who has only just turned five.

Five.

I am acutely aware of his safety — and the safety of others — is not guaranteed right now.

Will it get approved?

Probably not.

Is ERO visiting next term?

Of course they are.

Will I say something?

Obviously.

Will anything change?

…

That silence says enough.

Just when you think you’ve scraped the infernal barrel of hopelessness, someone hands you a new label:

SENCO.

And suddenly — you are the bottom line.

While still teaching five days a week.

In a school that says yes to everyone.

Because there is nowhere else for them to go.

Fifteen ORS-funded students already.

And counting.

And still… we write.

We justify.

We prove.

We wait.

“I didn’t ask for this.”

No.

But here we are anyway.

Holding the line.