Student Support Group Meetings in ACT Schools: What They Are and How to Use Them

If your child has a disability or additional learning needs in an ACT school, you'll hear the term "Student Support Group" (SSG) meeting used often — sometimes interchangeably with "ILP meeting." The two overlap but aren't identical. Understanding the difference, and knowing how to make these meetings actually produce enforceable outcomes, is one of the most practically useful things a parent can learn.

What a Student Support Group Meeting Is

A Student Support Group (SSG) is the collaborative team that develops, reviews, and oversees the implementation of an Individual Learning Plan (ILP) for a student with disability or additional needs. The meeting is the formal occasion when this team convenes.

In ACT public schools, the SSG meeting structure is defined by the Directorate's ILP Guidelines. The core participants must include:

• The classroom teacher — the person who implements daily adjustments and is closest to the student's moment-to-moment needs
• The principal or an authorized executive delegate — who chairs the meeting and has authority to approve resourcing commitments
• The parents or carers — who hold the legal right to participate in planning
• A Special Needs or Welfare team representative

Additional participants, depending on the student's complexity, may include school psychologists, external allied health therapists (occupational therapists, speech pathologists), NDIS providers, and professional advocates from organizations like ADACAS or Advocacy for Inclusion (AFI).

The meeting must designate a Case Coordinator from the school staff — the person responsible for day-to-day implementation — and a Recorder who documents what is agreed.

How SSG Meetings Differ from Informal Check-Ins

One of the most important distinctions to understand is the difference between a formal SSG/ILP meeting and an informal conversation with a teacher. Many parents spend months in informal discussions — emails, hallway conversations, brief chats at pickup — that feel productive but produce no binding documentation.

A formal SSG meeting:

• Produces a written ILP document or ILP review record that must be signed by participants
• Requires the principal or delegate to be present and authorize commitments
• Includes a Monitoring and Evaluation Plan assigning specific staff responsibility for tracking goals
• Can be triggered by parents at any time — you do not need to wait for the school's scheduled review cycle

An informal conversation:

• Creates no official record unless you follow up in writing
• Does not bind the school to any commitment
• Cannot authorize additional resourcing or staffing changes

If you've been having frequent informal conversations with your child's teacher but no SSG meeting has been scheduled for months, that gap is where adjustments get lost. Request a formal SSG meeting in writing.

What Gets Decided at an SSG Meeting

The core function of an SSG meeting is to review and update the ILP. Specifically, the meeting should:

Review existing ILP goals. Are the SMART goals from the last meeting being met? What data has been collected? Which adjustments are working and which are failing?

Set new goals for the coming period. Goals must be Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Timebound. Vague goals like "improve reading" are inadequate — a proper goal specifies the condition, the target behavior, and the measurement method.

Confirm adjustment commitments. The meeting should explicitly document which adjustments are in place, which are being added, and which are being removed — along with the reason for any changes.

Assign responsibility. The ILP must name specific staff members responsible for each adjustment. "The school will provide sensory breaks" is less useful than "Ms. [Teacher] will implement a 10-minute sensory break schedule at 10:30am and 1:30pm, tracked in the daily behavior log."

Set the next review date. The ACT Directorate recommends ILP goals be reviewed at least once per term. The meeting should confirm when the next review will occur.

Before the Meeting: What to Prepare

Going into an SSG meeting unprepared is the fastest way to walk out with vague commitments that evaporate by Monday morning. Parents who come prepared change the dynamic.

In the two weeks before the meeting:

Compile a Learning Support Portfolio. This includes recent diagnostic reports, allied health assessments, and any relevant NDIS plan documents. Current, specific evidence from external professionals is significantly harder for a school to dismiss than general parental concern.

Draft a Parent Statement. This is a one-to-two page document that covers: your child's key strengths, known triggers and de-escalation strategies, what has and hasn't worked previously, and your priorities for the coming term. Hand this to the Case Coordinator before the meeting so it can be included in the documentation.

Know your child's NCCD level. Understanding whether your child is assessed at QDTP, Supplementary, Substantial, or Extensive helps you calibrate what volume and intensity of adjustments is appropriate to request. Nationally, about 25.7% of students receive some level of educational adjustment — but the majority fall into lower adjustment bands. If your child's needs place them at a Substantial level, the adjustments should reflect that meaningfully.

Prepare your specific requests as a list. Vague requests get vague responses. "My child needs more support" is less effective than "I am requesting: (1) a visual daily schedule displayed in the classroom, (2) 30 additional minutes per week of small-group literacy support, (3) a designated quiet space accessible during sensory overload, and (4) weekly written updates to parents on progress toward goal 2."

During the Meeting: Key Moves

Insist that the classroom teacher is present. A meeting held only with administrative staff is operationally useless — the teacher is the person who implements adjustments daily. If the teacher cannot attend, reschedule.

Counter vague goals explicitly. If school staff propose a goal like "The student will improve their self-regulation skills," push back: "Can we make that measurable? What does improvement look like specifically, under what conditions, by what date, and who is tracking it?"

When a request is refused, ask for it in the minutes. If the school declines a specific adjustment, ensure the Recorder documents both the request and the refusal. This is critical for any future escalation.

Ask about the SCAN process if relevant. If your child's needs are significant and there has been no SCAN assessment, ask when one will be scheduled. The SCAN outcome directly determines centralized resourcing including Learning Support Assistant hours.

After the Meeting: The Paper Trail Matters

Within 24 to 48 hours of the meeting, send an email to the Case Coordinator and Principal summarizing the key commitments made. This is your own parallel record — separate from the official minutes. State the specific adjustments agreed, who is responsible for each, and the next review date.

If you notice discrepancies between the official minutes and your understanding of what was decided, raise them immediately in writing while they are fresh.

The Australian Capital Territory Disability Support Blueprint includes specific email templates for SSG meeting follow-ups, requests for urgent reviews, and documentation of refusals — grounded in ACT-specific processes and the DSE 2005 framework.

When SSG Meetings Stop Producing Results

If you have completed multiple SSG cycles and adjustments are consistently agreed but not implemented, or refused without documentation, that pattern is escalable. Your options are:

1. Formal complaint to the ACT Education Directorate (02 6205 5429)
2. Formal discrimination complaint to the ACT Human Rights Commission
3. Referral to ACAT if conciliation fails — within 60 days of the Commission closing the matter

An SSG meeting that produces an ILP on paper but nothing in practice is not a successful meeting. The measure of success is whether your child's school experience changes. If it doesn't, the SSG process has given you documentation — and that documentation is the foundation of any escalation.

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