The SI Community Forums were originally provided by BECTA, and then hosted by the DfE, until July 2019, when the DfE withdrew their servers.

The original four forums were:

  • HoSS (for Heads of SI Support Services)
  • QToD (for teachers and professionals working with deaf children and young people)
  • MSI (for qualified teachers of children with multi-sensory impairment or deafblindness)
  • VI (for professionals working with children and young people with vision impairment)

NatSIP provided an interim solution during 2018-19 for the HoSS Forum, to keep communication flowing to Heads of SI Services.  In October 2019 NatSIP offered a permanent solution to the wider SI community, with all 4 forums live on the new platform in November 2019, supported by DfE through Whole School SEND/nasen.

There are now five forums in the family:

The Deaf Education UK Forum is a platform to share good practice and seek solutions to the challenges of the profession. The purpose is is to enable QToDs/ToDs to exchange good practice, ask questions and discuss issues of current interest. The conversations are also open to Speech and Language Therapists, SENCOs, audiologists, support staff – anyone who may have pertinent questions and comments to share within the wide field of deaf education.

The HoSS forum is open to Heads of VI, HI and MSI Support Services for Children and Young People, and others with senior management responsibilities in this aspect of specialist work.  The purpose is to share ideas and information.

The Lead QToD (Resource Provisions) Forum (created in February 2022).  The purpose is to enable Lead QToDs to exchange good practice, ask questions and discuss issues of current interest. The value of the forum lies in the ease and openness with which individual Lead QToDs can ask questions about working practice, developments specific to specialist resource provisions, and share information and experience. The forum should inform strategic planning and development for resource provisions.

The MSI-Deafblindness Forum is an e-mail discussion list for QTMSIs and associated qualified MSI professionals working in the field of MSI-Deafblindness. The purpose is to share good practice, to ask and share questions and queries, and to disseminate research, information and ideas relating to MSI-Deafblindness. It is chiefly related to education and learning.

The VI Forum is an e-mail discussion list for for Qualified Teachers of Vision Impairment (QTVIs) and associated VI professionals to share good practice and seek solutions to the challenges of the VI profession. The purpose is to enable those who work with VI children and young people to ask questions and discuss issues of current interest. The conversations are also open to other VI professionals – anyone who may have pertinent questions and comments to share.

Subscription to any of the SI Community Forums is free. Colleagues, who meet the eligibility criteria, are encouraged to subscribe to more than one of the five forums.

The SI Community Forums project was founded, created and is powered by NatSIP, which has taken on the running and technical management of the forum platform. For more information, see the SI Community Forums website. 

It is possible for other SI organisations to join the Community Forums Project and to develop their own email forum.  Any organisations wanting to discuss joining the Project should approach Lindsey Rousseau (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.) for an initial discussion.

The HoSS (Heads of Sensory Services for Children and Young People) Email Forum is one of the five SI Community Forums and is moderated by Lindsey Rousseau of NatSIP.

The HoSS Forum currently (June 2024) has about 330 members and many participate in the discussions.  Messages posted to the forum, via email, are automatically sent to all members.  

The value of the forum lies in the ease and openness with which individual Heads of Services for Children and Young People can ask questions about working practice, developments in the field etc. and share information and experience. The forum should inform strategic planning and development for SI services. This is something that HoSS have generally been good at as a strong professional group over the years and, in times of ever increasing change and challenge, is especially important and helpful now.

The HoSS forum is well used considering that we represent a low-incidence SEND.

The forum is not intended to advertise job vacancies or other commercial publicity. Please continue to avoid this.

Members of the forum also need to be aware of the public nature of exchanges and ensure that they are not compromising their organisations when they reply, as replies are sent to the forum list (not the indivdual who sent the original message) by default.

Who can join the forum?
The HoSS Forum is open to Heads of VI, HI and MSI Support Services for Children and Young People, and others with senior management responsibilities in this aspect of specialist work. The purpose is to share ideas and information.  It is not appropriate that every team member of a SI service is listed on the forum.  The Head of Service can circulate the information as required.

How to join the forum:
To join the forum, complete and submit the on-line application form which you can find here.

Your request will be forwarded to the moderator, Lindsey Rousseau, who will check you meet the membership criteria, before your email address is added as a suscriber. In order to meet the requirements of GDPR, you must complete the form. We cannot accept requests by email, or on behalf of others.

How to use the forum:

Once approved you will automatically be sent copies of all emails subsequently posted to the forum and can read and respond as you wish.

If you are contributing to an on-going discussion, please reply to the most recent message you have seen on the topic, so that forum subscribers will see the discussion in threaded form

If you are starting a whole new discussion subject, please send a new mail to the forum’s mailbox: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..  This will cause a new thread to be started for your discussion. 

If you need to contact the forum's moderator or admin, they can be reached via email at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.,

Please continue to use the HOSS forum and help to maintain it as a lively and important professional vehicle for interchange of ideas and information.

The presentation about the SI Community Forums from the NatSIP/HoSS event on 4 February 2021 can be found document here .