Wokingham SEND places: 600 new, first hub opens this term

Wokingham Borough Council will spend more than £40 million by 2029 creating over 600 special educational needs and disabilities places inside the borough, and the first pieces of it arrive this term.

The council set out the programme on 25 August. The first wave of SEND provision inside mainstream schools opens across the 2026 autumn term, alongside the first of three post-16 hubs, on the upper floor of the former Wokingham Library in Denmark Street.

That hub now has a name and an operator. Activate Learning, appointed as lead provider in March, calls it The Glade and says it opens in September 2026.

What the £40m buys, and when

The council’s own breakdown:

• 260 new specialist school places, including a new special free school with 120 places at Rooks Nest, opening September 2028, and a refurbished special free school with about 80 places, opening September 2029
• more than 240 extra SEND places across 14 mainstream schools, split evenly between primary and secondary, each specialising in a different type of need: autism, social, emotional and mental health needs, moderate learning disabilities or hearing impairment
• three post-16 hubs offering 120 places in total, for young people aged 16 to 25 with an education, health and care plan
• a family-based early help SEND hub, which the council says is still being worked up

The council has not published which 14 mainstream schools will host the new provision. Its plans page, last updated on 20 August, carries no school names, and the announcement says details of many settings and locations are still being finalised. Parents choosing a school this autumn cannot yet see the list.

The Glade opens with far fewer than 120 places

The headline figure of 120 post-16 places covers all three hubs. The one opening this month is smaller than that, and it starts smaller still.

The business case the Executive approved in November 2024 (report, agenda item 49) sets the Denmark Street hub at 40 places once full. Its funding table shows 12 places in 2026/27, 26 in 2027/28 and 40 from 2028/29. The report’s own narrative puts the 2026 opening at 16 places. Either way, this is a provision that grows over three academic years rather than one that opens at capacity.

The capital cost is £1.5 million, met in full by a Department for Education grant. The council appointed Activate Learning in March on an estimated £4.65 million of top-up funding over an initial five years plus a possible two-year extension, paid from the High Needs Block of the Dedicated Schools Grant.

Why the council is spending

The council’s case is that placing a young person outside the borough costs far more. The 2024 business case values an average post-16 placement at an independent or non-maintained special school at £50,730 a year, against about £20,000 a place for a supported internship route and about £26,250 for a classroom-based vocational route at the hub. On those numbers it models cost avoidance of £1.1 million a year once the hub is full.

The pressure behind all of this is demand. The same report forecasts the number of Wokingham young people aged 16 to 25 with an EHCP rising from 393 in 2023/24 to 481 by 2028/29, an increase of 88, or 22.4 per cent. It names three types of need as the main drivers: autistic spectrum disorder, moderate learning difficulties, and social, emotional and mental health needs.

The money side is worse than the press release suggests. The council’s draft statement of accounts for the year ended 31 March 2026 records a Dedicated Schools Grant deficit of £52.9 million. That is a £17.7 million overspend in the year alone, against a £224 million allocation, on top of £36.9 million carried forward. The accounts call the escalation “of concern for Wokingham”.

Two further things sit in that document. The Safety Valve agreement with the Department for Education was to bring in about £20 million against delivery milestones, and £13.2 million had been received by 31 March 2026. And the Safety Valve programme has since ended nationally, replaced by a Local SEND Reform Plan that every council must submit. The accounts record that 90 per cent of the 2025/26 cumulative deficit would be supported once that plan is approved.

The two new schools, and the £13m that changed them

The special free school at Rooks Nest is not what was originally promised. Under Wave 3 of the national Special Free Schools Programme, confirmed in 2023, the DfE was to build two 120-place schools there.

In February the council agreed to take a one-off payment instead: £6.48 million for each of the two schools, about £13 million in total. It now plans one new school at Rooks Nest Farm for September 2028 and a second provision in refurbished school premises for September 2029. The council says the total number of extra special school places delivered locally should still be close to the 240 the DfE originally proposed, and that doing it this way puts places in front of families sooner.

The August announcement places Rooks Nest in Finchampstead. The February one describes it as Barkham/Finchampstead, on the boundary between the two.

What it means for you

• If your child is moving into Year 12 with an EHCP: The Glade is for learners aged 16 to 25 with an EHCP. Activate Learning says referrals are made through the local authority EHCP process and considered by a multi-agency admissions panel, via statutory consultation under section 39, before a place is agreed. You cannot apply directly; the route runs through your child’s plan and the council’s SEND team.
• If you are choosing a primary or secondary place: the 14 mainstream schools gaining specialist provision have not been named. Ask the school directly, and watch the council’s plans page, which it says it will update as details are confirmed.
• If you are waiting on an out-of-borough placement: the council is explicit that some pupils with more complex needs will still be educated outside Wokingham, because highly specialised settings draw from much wider catchment areas. The programme is not a promise that every placement comes home.
• On the timing: nothing at Rooks Nest opens before September 2028, and the refurbished provision not before September 2029. This term’s change is the mainstream provision and one post-16 hub.

Wokingham’s SEND Local Offer is the council’s statutory listing of support available locally.

More borough information: our pages on Wokingham planning news, council tax bands and bin collection days.