Dáil Éireann debate -
Thursday, 18 May 2000

Vol. 519 No. 4

Written Answers. - School Staffing.

Brian O'Shea

Question:

125 Mr. O'Shea asked the Minister for Education and Science the number of resource teachers and the number of remedial teachers to be appointed to primary schools in County Waterford in the 2000-01 school year and if he will make a statement on the matter. [13953/00]

Minister for Education and Science (Dr. Woods)

Resource teachers are allocated where there are a number of children with special educational needs, arising from a disability, who are fully integrated into mainstream national schools and where there are no other adequate support teaching resources available to the children. The eligibility of each child and the degree of need are established following consideration of reports on assessments carried out by relevant professionals.

Resource teacher posts may be sanctioned on a full-time basis, either in a single school or in a cluster of schools, provided there are sufficient children with special educational needs arising from a disability to warrant such a post. Alterna tively, part-time hours may be sanctioned to provide support teaching for individual children where there are insufficient children with special educational needs to warrant the allocation of a full-time or shared post.

The number of resource teachers to be sanctioned by my Department in the 2000-01 school year will be determined by the number of pupils who are assessed as being in need of support and for whom schools apply for such support.

In September 1999 the remedial teaching service was extended to all primary schools with a pupil teacher ratio of 10:1 or above. Schools with lower pupil teacher ratios were advised that they could seek remedial support where they could demonstrate a need for such a service.

All available posts were utilised in the current school year to ensure that no primary school in the country should be without a remedial teaching service. There are currently 40 remedial teachers in County Waterford.

I assure the Deputy that the remedial needs of the schools in County Waterford will be fully considered in the event of additional resources becoming available to improve existing remedial services.