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Dáil Éireann debate -
Tuesday, 30 Jan 2001

Vol. 529 No. 1

Written Answers. - School Staffing.

David Stanton

Question:

1285 Mr. Stanton asked the Minister for Education and Science if, further to Parliamentary Question No. 435 of 12 December 2000, he will state the training given to those people taking up to 500 full-time resource teaching posts and the equivalent of another 105 posts in part-time hours mentioned in his reply; the criteria employed by his Department in sanctioning appointments to such posts; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [2215/01]

Fully qualified primary school teachers are trained to deal with a variety of special needs in primary schools. The preparation of teachers at pre-service level to work with pupils with special needs is one of the issues being addressed by the working group on primary pre-service teacher education.

Six week-long training courses have been run for resource teachers over the past year as part of in-service training. These courses have been located at St. Patrick's College, Drumcondra; Mary Immaculate College, Limerick and St. Angela's College, Sligo. To date, 180 resource teachers have availed of these in-service courses. Further training programmes are planned for the future.

Resource teacher support is allocated to address the special educational needs of children with disabilities attending ordinary schools on a fully integrated basis. The level of support provided in each case is based on the professionally assessed needs of the individual child and has regard to the prevailing pupil teacher ratio applicable to the particular disability category involved.
Resource teacher support is allocated on a full-time or part-time basis, depending on the number of children involved in a local area and the level of their special needs. The criteria applicable to the allocation of resource teacher support were notified to national schools in a circular issued by my Department in April, 1999. My Department is continuing to allocate resource teacher support in response to identified needs.
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