CUSTTAD

The development of CUSTTAD in SOUTH LANARKSHIRE took place over a period of several years following an agreement between the then YORKHILL NHS TRUST and the authority's SPECIAL NEEDS Department. As the number of CUSTTAD facilities increased two different models emerged. Our preferred and probably totally unrealistic one (advocated by among others Dr John D Allan) was to have a self staffed CUSTTAD ROOM in every primary school.

Much more realistically we moved towards having a network of facilities strategically located to provide access to CUSTTAD for as many children as possible and serviced by a group of trained CUSTTAD workers. At the present time there are 12 facilities.  

One of the main lessons we learned from our association with SOUTH LANARKSHIRE is that an approach like CUSTTAD requires a long gestation period in which the ideas and concepts have plenty of time to be taken on and assimilated - and that the proof as always is in the pudding. Teachers and interested others need to see that the work actually works for the children it is intended to help. And that awareness involves a lot of hard work from at least a few dedicated workers - and fortunately there were several of these.

In contrast the project in GLASGOW failed because an attempt was made to impose the approach on an already well established system rather than setting it up one school and allowing it to grow slowly from there.