Welcome to VAL’s Community
Where children and young people are supported to feel safe, valued and ready to thrive. A specialist provider of education and care for children with special educational needs, physical disabilities, additional learning needs and learning disabilities including autism, complex communication needs and associated difficulties.
Care and education belong together.
Across our schools and children’s homes, our teams work as one to give every child the right environment, the right support and the right opportunities to grow.
We believe care and education belong together. Whether a child lives in one of our homes, attends one of our schools, or both, they experience a joined-up, consistent and deeply personal approach built around who they are never around a label or diagnosis.
Our promise Validate · Achieve · Live
- Validate
- we listen to and accept every child’s view of the world.
- Achieve
- we celebrate progress, measured in meaningful steps.
- Live
- we make sure childhood is full, happy and full of opportunity.
Our Schools
Guided by SHINE
Ofsted- and Estyn-registered specialist day schools delivering bespoke curriculums and educational pathways tailored to individual children that builds confidence, communication and independence.
Explore our schoolsOur Homes
Guided by HEART
More than just a home, our services provide safe, nurturing and stable environments where children and young people with learning disabilities and diverse neurodevelopmental needs can thrive. Through compassionate, therapeutic care delivered by highly skilled specialist teams, we empower children to build confidence, develop independence and achieve meaningful outcomes.
Explore our homesHomes & schools across the UK
Ivie Lodge
Leicester · East Midlands
Ivie Lodge provides medium- to long-term care for up to four children with learning disabilities who may also have emotional, social and behavioural difficulties as a result of past trauma. We offer a happy, homely, safe, nurturing and stimulating environment where children feel safe and positive, cared for by a motivated, passionate and committed team. We aim to help children return to their families where possible, or to achieve a permanent placement suited to their long-term needs building the skills to live as independently as possible.
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Aspiration House
Frieston, Lincolnshire · Lincolnshire
Aspiration House is a learning-disability and autism-specialist children's home for up to eight children, where children are supported with warmth, consistency and respect. Many of our children communicate without spoken language, experience high anxiety during change, and rely on routine, sensory regulation and relational safety. Our ethos is grounded in Positive Behaviour Support, trauma-informed practice and low-arousal approaches, and the home benefits from on-site education, enabling consistent support across both care and learning.
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Inspire
Lincolnshire · Lincolnshire
At Inspire, we believe every child deserves a home where they feel safe, accepted and truly understood and that's exactly what we've set out to create. Inspire is a residential home for children who are autistic and/or have a learning disability, many of whom communicate through behaviour, movement or expression rather than words, and who experience the world with heightened senses and big feelings. Our home is gentle by design. Lighting, colour, sound and space are all carefully considered to keep things low-arousal and predictable, with room to join in or take a quiet moment whenever a child needs one. Our approach is therapeutic and regulation-focused: when a child feels overwhelmed, we stay alongside them, keep our words few and our presence steady, and help them feel calm and reconnected again. Behind it all is a team who genuinely love what they do. Calm, consistent and endlessly patient, they meet each child exactly where they are, on their terms and at their pace. Many of our children arrive having not always been understood before; at Inspire, that changes trust grows, confidence builds, and children begin to thrive. We'd love to show you around and let you feel the difference for yourself. Please do get in touch there's no better way to understand Inspire than to come and see it.
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Care. Learning. Love.
Talk to our placements team about a child you’re commissioning for. We’ll share availability, age range, EHCP fit and arrange a visit.