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JOINT COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION AND SCIENCE debate -
Thursday, 18 Dec 2003

Vol. 1 No. 28

National Educational Psychological Service: Presentation.

I welcome Ms Lee McCurtain, acting director of NEPS and Mr. Sean Wiley, HEO.

Before we begin I draw the committee's attention to the fact that members have absolute privilege. However, privilege does not apply to witnesses appearing before the committee. I also remind members of the long-standing parliamentary practice to the effect that members should not comment on, criticise or make charges against a person outside the House and should not refer to an official by name in such a manner as to make him or her identifiable.

Ms Lee McCurtain

A copy of our presentation has been circulated to members. It begins with an historical note outlining the psychological services available to schools in this country.

The first psychological service for schools was initiated in 1960 by the City of Dublin Vocational Education Committee to serve schools under its remit. In 1965, the Department of Education established its own psychological service. The function assigned to the psychologists was the development of guidance service in the new comprehensive schools and, afterwards, in post-primary schools generally. I mention that because we are often asked why we started the service in post-primary rather than primary schools.

In 1990, a pilot project for the development of a psychological service to primary schools was undertaken by the Department's psychological service in one urban disadvantaged area and one rural area. In 1991, County Dublin VEC established a psychological support service for the schools under its remit.

In 1997, the then Minister for Education set up a planning group to survey existing psychological services to schools and to make recommendations on future provision. That group reported in 1998, recommending the establishment of a National Educational Psychological Service with an ultimate target of 200 psychologists in the educational system, a psychologist to student ratio of 1:5,000. It also recommended that the service should be organised in ten regions equivalent to the health board regions in order to facilitate liaison and collaborative work between the sectors.

The Government accepted the recommendations and, on 1 September 1999, NEPS was established on an administrative basis in the Department of Education and Science. It was to be developed over a five year period until 1 September 2004. It is envisaged that NEPS will be established on a statutory basis under the provisions of the Education Act 1998 but currently it is effectively a section of the Department.

In April 2000, the management committee of NEPS presented to the Minister a draft development plan on its roll-out to schools and, in 2001, followed this with a statement of strategy. We will begin a new strategic statement next year. I look forward to the feedback from this meeting in that regard. The current task of NEPS is to implement the report of the planning group and to achieve the targets set in the statement of strategy.

On the professional side, the Government decision to establish NEPS included details of how staff numbers were to increase gradually over the five year development period. The final total of psychologists in the educational system will be 200, so the actual final total within NEPS will depend on the number of psychologists elsewhere in the system. That figure has fluctuated. The estimate varies between 176 and 184. There is provision in the report for a review of staffing at the end of the development period.

When we were established in 1999 30 psychologists in full-time permanent employment transferred to NEPS and they were joined by 13 psychologists on secondment to the agency. Although the recruitment of psychologists by the Civil Service Commission has been more time-consuming than envisaged, good progress has been made. Two competitions have been held and there was an excellent response to the advertisements. There were more than 300 applications for the first competition and more than 200 for the second. Currently, there are 127 psychologists in NEPS, plus two on career break. Offers of employment are currently being made to five psychologists who remain on the Civil Service Commission panel.

The task of inducting and mentoring so many newly appointed psychologists has been a challenge for NEPS, and a faster rate of expansion would have been difficult to sustain. It should be borne in mind that while psychologists can, in certain circumstances, work from home, administrative staff need to be located in an office. The roll-out of administrative staff has depended on the availability of office accommodation. Some 22 members of our administrative staff, including three dedicated IT staff, are based in the head office, Frederick Court, Drogheda, Clondalkin, Blackrock, County Dublin, Clonmel, Cork, Castlebar and Sligo. It is expected that, in the near future, additional administrative staff will be allocated to Tralee and Cork.

NEPS is working with the Department and the Office of Public Works to develop a national network of regional and local offices in approximately 24 locations. This places a heavy burden on NEPS head office which has to deal with general project management, services, furniture, IT equipment and relocation of psychologists. We have prepared two appendices: one illustrates the location and status of regional and local offices and the other illustrates which members of professional and administrative staff are based in the different regions. Some 23 psychologists are currently home-based. It is our aim to ensure everyone has office accommodation.

ICT has a major role in NEPS in facilitating a quality service in enhancing communications, in providing access to information and data, and in improving efficiency and effectiveness. Current NEPS ICT structures include a technical support unit which supports staff in relation to hardware and software, and is involved in the establishment of a separate IT domain for NEPS. Currently, six NEPS offices have been brought on line. We have two main projects in the IT area. The first is Casetrack, a client tracking system developed in March 2002 in conjunction with the IT unit in the Department of Education and Science. It provides case management facilities to psychologists who will track students who have been seen by NEPS and will facilitate statistical analysis of this aspect of the work of the agency. Three versions of the application are in use: a network version in Dublin offices linked to the NEPS domain; a stand-alone PC version, used by a small number of home-based psychologists, and a paper based system. While these systems are operational, difficulties are being experienced in providing administrative resources to support the system.

The second project is the weightings database developed in conjunction with the IT unit of the Department of Education and Science in 2001. It is designed to assist in the equitable allocation of psychologists to schools. It draws on data from existing Department of Education and Science schools databases and assigns weights based on criteria witch reflect the need for psychological services. We have the only database covering primary and post-primary schools. A review of the operation of the weighting database is currently under way.

Page 4 of the document contains the financial summary showing the pay and non-pay elements and the total financial outturn.

NEPS serves approximately 1,790 primary schools and 650 post-primary schools. A table in our submission shows the coverage in each region broken down by schools and pupils. We have tended to concentrate first on large schools with high levels of disadvantage, which means that the coverage of pupils is higher than the coverage of schools. We now have full coverage of all mainstream schools in County Kerry and in the Connemara Gaeltacht and the east coast region is practically on target. There has been difficulty in recruiting psychologists for certain areas of the country, notably the mid-west, the midlands and the north west.

The report of the planning group recommended a ratio of one psychologist to approximately 5,000 students. This has now been refined by the introduction of the weighting database, which gives a points weighting to each school. As additional psychologists are appointed, each is given the number of points recommended rather than a number of students. This means there is a fair degree of uniformity nationwide in the psychologist to student ratios, but not in terms of coverage per county. We do not serve the VEC schools in the Dublin city and county.

I will now describe the service to schools. The report of the planning group recommended that NEPS psychologists should devote 65% of their time in schools to individual casework and 35% to support and development work. The NEPS model of service to schools is outlined in the leaflet that has been supplied to the committee. Our aim is to provide a flexible response. Each psychologist has a list of named schools to serve, which are visited on a regular basis. The number of visits per school per annum is determined by the information on the weighting database, with other factors also being taken into account, if necessary.

At the beginning of each school year, the psychologist meets the principal and support staff to agree on a work plan for the school year using a standard form. This plan may need to be adjusted during the year, as new priorities emerge. During each psychologist's visit to the school, there will be an opportunity to discuss children who have not been referred as well as those who have been referred. Psychologists can offer advice to teachers on learning support programmes and behavioural management for the non-referred children, thus benefiting many children with whom we do not have individual contact.

In April 2003, the east coast region conducted a survey of all its psychologists, to determine such matters as waiting times for assessment, numbers of projects, etc. The details can be made available to the members of the committee, if requested.

Individual psychological assessment is a core skill of the educational psychologist. It is part of a collaborative process that also includes school-based testing, programme planning, intervention, monitoring and review of progress. The Department now places the primary responsibility for assessment on teachers. Recently published documents emphasise the importance of a cycle within which the assessment of need is part of the intervention. The main role of the psychologist is to support and advise teachers in this process and only to involve themselves in casework where the school's interventions have been insufficient or if the child needs additional resources or facilities.

In recent years, dissatisfaction has been expressed with the level of availability of individual psychological assessments. The large demand is due, for the most part, to the procedural requirement that psychological reports be furnished if schools are to obtain extra resources from the Department in respect of children with special educational needs. To meet this demand we initiated the scheme for commissioning psychological assessments for those schools that do not yet have access to NEPS. It is a limited psychological service.

The Department is examining alternative ways of ascertaining the need for extra resources for individuals or groups of children. This is being discussed with the partners in education and should reduce the demand for individual assessments. We ask psychologists to include in their service plans time for urgent cases that might not have been included in the school plan - for example, severe behavioural difficulties or severe disability or children who are the subject of legal proceedings. Such requests are responded to in a matter of days.

Page 7 of our submission contains a table showing the number of assessments carried out by NEPS psychologists only and not by SCPA psychologists. I apologise to members of the committee for the incorrect numbering on the tables in the document.

Support and development work arises either out of general concerns raised by the school principal and staff at the initial meeting or out of the psychologist's individual casework in the school. Some examples are supplied in the model of service leaflet. I have also given two examples of larger-scale projects.

The screening project, which is taking place in all primary schools in County Leitrim and in Dundalk is being carried out in partnership with the primary curriculum support programme, PCSP, the Educational Research Centre, ERC, and the in-career development unit, ICDU. The aim is to inform the Department of the probable prevalence of children with disabilities in our schools. This has not been done intensively before in Ireland. The project starts with the training of learning support teachers followed by administration of screening tests and processing of results. The report to the Department is in preparation.

Another project in which we have been involved relates to critical or traumatic incidents. NEPS provides a service to all schools - not just those on our list - that may have experienced a critical or traumatic event. This is usually provided in collaboration with the health boards. A NEPS working group has conducted an extensive literature research and has surveyed the experiences of schools and psychologists both here and in other jurisdictions. The outcome has been two resource packs, one for psychologists and one for schools, which will be disseminated early in 2004. Copies of the pack for schools are available to the committee and I hope members will find these useful.

We have given the committee details of the number of assessments and the cost of the scheme for commissioning psychological assessments. As previously mentioned, this is just for schools with no access to NEPS assessments. We consider the scheme to be an interim measure, pending the roll-out of NEPS to all schools.

We have started to engage in a process of evaluation of customer service, which has been identified as a priority strategic objective for us. Each team of psychologists has been asked to pilot an evaluation instrument each term surveying customer satisfaction. We have published our quality customer service statement and, as with all documents, this is available in both English and Irish. It is accompanied by a quality customer service action plan, which will be monitored during the coming year.

Apart from delivering a service to schools a lot of work needed to be done in drafting policies and procedures for a whole range of activities and contingencies. This has largely been done by means of internal drafting groups, that is by the psychologists themselves in addition to their work in schools. There is a wide process of consultation with all psychologists and other staff before reports are signed off. Approximately 20 substantial reports have been produced this way. We accorded high priority to this work in the early years but we are now placing less emphasis on it and concentrating almost entirely on the work in schools.

We need to continue work on planning for the move to statutory status. This is the subject of ongoing discussions between the Department and the various staff interests involved.

I welcome the delegates and thank them for their presentation. Some of my questions relate to the report on the NEPS from its foundation in 1999 until 2001. Ms McCurtain dealt with some of the issues in the presentation. Reference was made to the task of developing and providing an educational psychological service to all students in primary and post-primary schools and in certain other recognised centres. What other recognised centres are included?

On the roll-out of NEPS, the expansion of the service to further schools and the appointment of additional psychologists are crucial. Ms McCurtain outlined the resources needed and the Comptroller and Auditor General outlined the resources the NEPS currently has, which are a long way short of what is necessary. The Education for Persons with Disabilities Bill is now being considered in the House and, based on the presentations made by the disability groups, I believe it will put a huge additional strain on the NEPS.

When the NEPS issued its draft plan and estimated the number of psychologists required, the Bill was not published although I know there was talk of it coming on stream. Do the delegates feel they will require extra staff to deal with the requirements imposed on the service by the Bill, presuming it will be passed without amendment?

The delegates told us where the service operates. They stated there is a difficulty recruiting psychologists in the midlands, where I am based, the mid-west and the northwest. The Midland Health Board is having difficulty basing speech and language therapists, etc. in its administrative area. Why is this the case and how can it be addressed? Is there a sufficient number of qualified psychologists in Ireland or are they all based in certain areas? Although UCC and UCG have new courses in this area, is there a lack of courses?

Ms McCurtain referred to the core work in schools and stated that the report recommended that NEPS psychologists should devote 65% of their time in schools to individual casework and 35% to support and development work. Is this ratio being achieved? Is it the right balance?

The report also considers the task forces on dyslexia and autism. I suppose many of the recommendations have not yet been implemented and I hope the Education for Persons with Disabilities Bill will improve circumstances for people with dyslexia or autism. How have the task forces impacted on the work of NEPS? A considerable role would have been envisaged for the delegates. Has this come to pass?

As we have raised with the Minister on some occasions, there is still a problem regarding people falling between two organisations. Often these are the Departments of Health and Children and Education and Science. Now people sometimes fall between the health boards and the NEPS. Consider, for example, a school in County Offaly which, according to a report yesterday, is to have two new classrooms for children for autism. This has to be welcomed, yet the school is not receiving a psychological service. Providing this unit without providing the necessary services does not make much sense. The health board wrote to the school in 2002 when it requested the necessary therapists, etc., from the health board and stated psychological services are to be provided to the school through NEPS. The regional director wrote in 2003 to state that an agreement was made between the Departments of Education and Science and Health and Children to the effect that health services would not be withdrawn until NEPS was in a position to deliver the services. This is clearly the agreement in place but it is of no use to the school in question. Is there anything to ensure that the service will be provided in cases where the health board does not step in to do what is currently its responsibility?

The delegates stated they have carried out a survey of schools and I would appreciate if a copy of it could be circulated to the committee. I conducted a survey recently and answers are still being sent back, but some of the comments I have received are interesting. Even if one considers the same county and, in some cases, the same town and asks the citizens the average time spent waiting for an assessment, one will find that the answers are extremely varied. One school said three years and another in the same town said three months. Although these are the schools' opinions, how could this be the case?

If there are six children waiting for an assessment in a particular school, who makes a judgment call on who is to be assessed first? One question I asked in my survey was, "How many teachers at your school have had special educational needs training?" I suppose I am not surprised by the response that very few have had such training. Some schools had no teachers with special educational needs training. Is this having an impact on NEPS, given that the teachers are the first port of call and the first to make a judgment before the NEPS is contacted?

Although schools have to wait three months or even years for a NEPS assessment, they then have to wait for services to be allocated. One school which received the psychologist's report in March has not yet had special resources allocated to the students who need them. Do the delegates believe there is a delay in this regard?

Another comment I received from my survey was from a school that had NEPS assessments but could not proceed further because the psychologist in question is on maternity leave. That is fair enough, but I presume there are not enough staff to replace her.

Many of the answers stated that NEPS has granted four assessments to each school. Teachers say they are prioritising without necessarily having the skills or qualifications to do so. What if a school has another two or three pupils who, in the opinion of the teachers, need to be assessed urgently? Is it fair to suggest that such children are not really being reached?

The Department spent €2 million funding private psychological assessments. Had that money been allocated to NEPS, could enough psychologists have been employed? How is the judgment made as to who gets the money and how are the private assessments judged? Is it a matter of choosing the schools with absolutely no NEPS or is there some overlap?

I welcome Mr. Wiley and Ms McCurtain, whose presentation was very informative. Like everybody else, I am extremely interested in this area. Deputy Enright referred to the time lag. From what I have heard I too understand that it varies from place to place. What can be done in the short to medium term to shorten the time lag? It is an area of extreme concern for teachers.

We have the NEPS, Special Education Council and the Education Welfare Board. At first glance, the latter would seem to be a distinctly different professional entity. I am thinking in terms of pre-school and early childhood education and I see the need for a very close relationship between the various bodies concerned. How does the delegation envisage the evolution of NEPS? The delegation told us that it is still part of the Department of Education and Science and envisaged that it would be on a statutory basis in the short to medium term. Is this a good thing?

How does the delegation envisage the NEPS evolving alongside the special education council and the educational welfare board? Is there enough potential for the bodies to complement one another? How will the roles evolve for the various professionals involved in the overall service? I include the educational welfare board as I attach huge significance to it in both school and pre-school. It is important that a holistic approach is taken and I believe a multi-disciplinary team will bring this to bear on problems at the earliest stage.

I have always believed in the importance of a family-centred approach to education problems. Over the years, the Government has thrown billions of euro towards child support. While nobody would detract from the merits of child support, I have often felt the effectiveness of this money was diminished in the absence of a more holistic family-centred approach. Given the experience the delegation has gained as psychologists, how does it envisage bringing parents towards the centre and becoming the solution to problems in pre-school and early childhood education?

In terms of the roll-out, there are currently only 127 psychologists and there should be 200 by September 2004. The delegation has indicated that there has been a good response from psychologists to the interview process. When does the delegation expect the full complement to be filled?

I represent the mid-west region and it has a fairly small supply of psychologists and does not have a central office. Our region, and other regions in a similar position such as the midlands and south east, are concerned about this.

The Departments suggestion that each school should be entitled to one assessment per 50 students is a real problem for many schools as the number of children requiring psychological assessment varies from school to school. There should be more flexibility in this area. What is the feeling of the delegation about this?

Senator Fitzgerald asked about parents. Departmental circulars seem to suggest that parents cannot initiate a psychological assessment. The procedure seems to be that the class teacher addresses the problem for the first term or two and it then falls to the school to suggest the need for an assessment by a psychologist. What is the feeling of the delegation on this? Related to this, how does the delegation see the Education for Persons with Disabilities Bill impacting on the work of the NEPS?

The guidelines the NEPS has to work under seem to constrain the profession in what it can do. The limits within which psychologists can make an assessment seem to be narrow. For example, if a child is hard of hearing or has visual impairment, the psychologist can say a child needs specific time-based assistance. One of the departmental circulars says that pupils with visual impairment and no other assessed disability may be allocated a maximum of 3.5 hours per week additional teaching support from a resource teacher. Do psychologists feel the rules set down by the Department are constraining them from making decisions on the needs of individual children that should be their professional right to make? It seems there are now many more constraints than there would have been even one year ago and a number of circulars have been sent to schools. The feeling is that many psychological assessments, particularly those carried out outside the NEPS, are rejected, as they are not considered to be within the guidelines of the Department of Education and Science. There is a feeling that children in need of support are being denied it, not because of what the psychologist might think, but because of the constraints of the Departments circulars.

If we had the time we could elaborate on various aspects of what is happening to the NEPS. The €2 million paid to deal with the backlog could have been better spent. I want to focus on the guidelines that limit the level of therapy a psychologist may recommend for a special needs child and if I offend members of the NEPS I apologise in advance. One circular reminds professional practitioners and schools that the resources already available to the school to meet the special educational needs of a child with a disability should be considered before recommendations and applications for additional resources are made to the Department of Education and Science. Given that in all sectors, the Government is moving to a generic type of application-based assistance - such as dietary allowance and rent allowance - the "one size fits all" approach is not going to work for everyone. If resources are given to a school to include special educational needs, then the Department of Education and Science can say there are enough funds available within the school. There is a dichotomy at play here and it is not fair to put in on to psychologists.

Deputy O'Sullivan mentioned hearing or visual impairments and the maximum teaching support that can be allocated to children who suffer from these. The circular in question says that resource teaching should only be recommended where such pupils experience persistent failure in the ordinary class - they have to fail before any need can be found. Private psychologists have assessed children in a number of cases. These psychologists may say that a child needs X number of hours, yet the guidelines say resources are only available for Y number of hours. There has been criticism of employees of the NEPS who have taken this template, looked at what was drawn up by the private psychologist, disagreed with it, and changed it because it did not fall within the guidelines.

Does Ms McCurtain believe psychologists working under NEPS are having their professional standing compromised by having to work within guidelines which are not specified in black and white but rather they are issued and perhaps psychologists feel they must adhere to them strictly? Is there any means by which they can say they disagree with a guideline and that they recommend ten hours? As seems to be case from reports of parents, the normal practice seems to be that if five hours is what is to be provided, the psychologist writes in five hours. If that is the case, although I have said that psychologists are being compromised professionally, if they persist in it knowingly, they are prostituting their profession. Does Ms McCurtain believe that psychologists working within the NEPS are prostituting their position or is the Department of Education and Science putting severe pressure on them to compromise their profession?

Could the Deputy use a more suitable term than "prostituting"?

I want to get a strong reaction to get at the truth. I am not accusing anyone. I am saying there are allegations that this occurs. Perhaps "selling short one's profession" is more appropriate.

All medical practitioners take an oath and the onus is on them to live up to it. If it is their professional opinion that more than five hours is required, then whatever the Department guidelines state, they should push for it. If resources are the issue, that does not matter one whit. We have examples where a psychologist from the Department of Health and Children says ten hours and one from the Department of Education and Science says five hours. Although there is a difference of opinion there, we cannot examine it further. The five hours must go because the Department of Education and Science is providing the resources under those guidelines. This is sending out a dangerous message.

Given that the Education for People with Disabilities Bill 2003 is being discussed in the new year, the situation is in danger of falling apart. Parents and groups representing students with various learning disabilities are up in arms in regard to the guidelines. I would like to know if these guidelines will be changed.

There are often no NEPS services in schools. Schools with one to 50 pupils get one assessment, schools with 51 to 100 pupils get two assessments and schools with 101 to 150 pupils get three. This is treating people with disabilities by numbers. Every area has its own cases. There may be environmental factors relating to certain learning disabilities but every geographical area has its own cluster of learning disability. One cannot base provision merely on the number of pupils in a school. What is the view on this? Can the NEPS challenge the Minister and state that it does not agree with this policy because the profession is being compromised by the guidelines?

The funding for NEPS was increased by 1% in this year's Estimates. Will that affect the service? NEPS has 127 psychologists who serve over 2,000 primary groups. The planning group which proposed NEPS recommended an overall target of 200 psychologists of whom 180 would be in the NEPS and the remainder elsewhere. Do the witnesses believe these targets can be met and is the figure accurate?

I presume the delegation has had the opportunity to look at the Education for Persons with Disabilities Bill 2003. Are the current staff levels sufficient to carry out the assessment provided for in the Bill? One of the main criticisms of the lobbying groups was that they were worried that if the NEPS programme was not up and running, the system would fail and all the good work done by the Bill would fall.

The witnesses referred to psychological assessments by private practitioners. I note there are 137 of them, although there is none for Cavan, Monaghan, Leitrim, Carlow and just one for Kilkenny and Laois and other counties account for a mere handful. The service seems to be centred on the Dublin and east coast area. What work is being done to try to expand this service?

I note from the annual report that links were being made with psychologists and contacts with educational psychologists in the Six Counties. How are these links being developed and how helpful have they been? Is it possible that they may provide assistance to us, particularly in areas long the Border, where the NEPS coverage is light? Do they have an approved psychologist list and could there be agreement on sharing such lists and staff?

I welcome Ms McCurtain and Mr. Wiley. I apologise for having been absent for part of the meeting. I had been looking forward to hearing an uninterrupted presentation this morning but unfortunately it did not work that way. I also apologise if some of my questions were answered during my absence.

Are the 127 psychologists who have been appointed educational psychologists or standard psychologists, since I imagine the former is the preferred option in regard to teamwork? How many within NEPS are educational psychologists?

I am aware of one school, which may be just one example of many others, where just one psychologist is available to make two reports per year. No student is ever reviewed again. They go through the system. This is unacceptable.

I understand there are serious deficiencies in staffing in NEPS. Is this because of a lack of funding? If the funding was in place, would the psychologists be available? Should newly-trained psychologists be taken on in this specialised field? My view is that they should be people with specific experience, preferably educational experience. My recommendation to the Minister is that an initiative should be undertaken by the Department to engage teachers who may be interested in taking on the discipline of psychology and would then enter the field, rather than newly-qualified psychologists.

We can see there is a deficit in staffing in the NEPS and children's needs are not being met. This is an issue about which the committee in concerned which must be addressed urgently by the Minister and the Department.

Like Deputy Hoctor, I apologise for missing part of the presentation. I hope that my questions are not a repeat. As a member of a school's board of management rather than as a Deputy from Clondalkin, I am familiar with the NEPS new office and I have seen the service work. When we started having psychological assessments carried out for children in the school, all the children we had assessed had difficulties of one sort or another which were flagged to us by teachers in the school - that was the normal entry to the system. We had such children assessed by NEPS or privately. The board of management funded some of them. As years have passed, because we have gone through the numbers, each year we are looking at the new entrants to the school.

From the NEPS point of view what does it see as the demands? It is to have 200 psychologists. Is there a backlog to be dealt with, the workload of which will then even out? Is it being looked at in that way?

When and how often should repeat assessments be carried out? One can catch a child at five or six years of age and determine a difficulty and plan a programme. However, how does one find out how the child is responding to that programme? How does he or she need to be reassessed and when? I have a difficulty from a board of management point of view. Reassessments are not being done frequently enough.

Unlike Deputy Gogarty, who referred to assessments and the number of additional hours that might deliver, I am not as concerned about it. There are 100 psychologists now and there will be 200 in time. I have seen disagreements on the reports so what kind of internal systems are there to monitor the work of the psychologists in order that it is standardised?

What sort of internal systems are there to monitor the work of the psychologists and ensure that they are - I will not say standardised. These are professionals and, as in any other area, somebody can come along with a second opinion. What sort of internal structures are in place to ensure that a particular standard is applied nationally rather than varying from area to area? They are my two main areas of questioning.

I welcome Ms McCurtain and Mr. Wiley. I apologise for missing part of their presentation but duty called in the Chamber. I also acknowledge the work that NEPS is doing. Given that the body has been in place for a relatively short period, and the pressures and strains it is under, it is doing a pretty good job. The witnesses did invite comments and interaction, which I welcome.

My first question relates to the employment of psychologists. To my knowledge, and please correct me if I am wrong, there are no statutory criteria as to who is a psychologist. How does NEPS decide who should be a psychologist? What criteria does it employ? Does somebody require qualifications in educational, clinical or child psychology for instance, or in all three? What experience is required or desirable? Is it true that quite a number of psychologists may be new graduates? How are people inducted? Is there a training module and how does it work? There are many different areas of psychology and I would be interested to know what recommendations NEPS would have. The Education for People with Disabilities Bill 2003 mentions "a psychologist" but it does not qualify what a psychologist is.

I notice that a lot is made in the guidelines of IQ scores. I understand that using raw IQ scores is really outdated, and I ask whether NEPS has looked at any other methods of assessing children rather than ongoing assessments. What research is (on-going) internationally? I know that Howard (Gardiner) has done a lot of work, with which I am sure the witnesses are familiar, on different types of intelligence. I would be concerned if children were assessed on one type of intelligence only. They may have very great strengths in other areas.

This brings me to another area that concerns me and, I am sure, my colleagues. The guidelines issued by the Department state that resource teaching should only be recommended where such pupils are experiencing persistent failure. The guidelines seem to be failure-based throughout. In other words, someone must be a proven "failure" in order to get help. Much damage can be done by the time that occurs, and I would like the views of the witnesses. I would welcome a more positive approach. I am very alarmed when I see that persistent failure must be experienced.

This brings me to a recommendation, if I may. Colleagues have asked about circular No. 802 and other circulars issued recently by the Department and how they have changed the operation of NEPS and the way that psychologists and others in NEPS treat reports from outside psychologists in particular. I have certainly come across a number of professional experienced psychologists whose reports were not accepted because they did not conform with circular No. 802 or some other circular.

With the greatest of respect, it took me a while to find out what that meant. I put down parliamentary questions to the Minister to find out what this means. Perhaps the witnesses would explain why professional, experienced psychologists make recommendations, reports and assessments, only for NEPS to say they are not acceptable. How often does that happen? I stand to be corrected if I am wrong, but it seems to be happening a lot more than it used to.

I know this has been brought up already, but for schools without a NEPS service there seems to be a graduated scale whereby if they have under 50 students they are allowed one assessment per year, and so on down the line. That seems very cumbersome. Some schools may have only 50 students but three of them need help. Would the witnesses agree that this method is unfair? Another school with 200 students would be allowed five assessments according to the information in front of me but may not need any. Surely the assessment should be based on need rather than some kind of raw score.

Getting back to the circulars and the reasons children may be deemed not to require help, would it be possible for NEPS, when writing back to schools, to give the reasons in plain, simple English so that the parents will understand? It can be done in a positive way rather than referring to failure to meet this or that circular or criterion. I say this to be helpful.

I would also like the views of the witnesses on autism. They are probably aware of research I have seen from the Southern Health Board indicating that we will see an explosion in autism cases in the next number of years. Is NEPS aware of this and what planning and preparation has it done? What figures does it possess for the rest of the country as I am only aware of the Southern Health Board figures? Do they have any idea why we are seeing such an explosion in autism cases? This international phenomenon is also evident in Britain, America and Canada. I have also seen some of the international research and the problem seems to be growing everywhere.

There are different approaches to autism, including teaching methodology, ABA and so on, and I would like the views of the witnesses on the different methodologies. Would they agree, for instance, that parents should have a choice? I know they are aware of the proposal to establish a centre of excellence in Middletown, County Armagh. Has NEPS been involved in that at any level? If so, what is that involvement and what are its views on it?

Has NEPS had an input into the Education for Persons with Disabilities Bill 2003? Has it made submissions to the Department on it? If so, would it be possible for NEPS to make available copies of such submissions to the committee also? If NEPS has any views on the Bill I know that members of the committee would be very interested in seeing and learning from them because we will debate the Bill as a committee shortly and the views of NEPS would be very valuable.

Another issue is children who are not in the school system. Many children with special educational needs leave school because those needs are not being met, especially when they reach their early teens. Quite a number of children do not transfer from primary to second level and may leave because they have special educational needs. Quite often their parents are not in a position to assist either. Is NEPS able to engage with those children outside the school system or is it solely based in the system? Excuse my ignorance on that point but I would like it clarified. Some families like to teach their children at home, for which an exemption is obviously required. Is NEPS in a position to support children if necessary in those circumstances?

I could go on but I think I have taken enough of the committee's time for the moment.

Some members want to ask additional questions or make additional points.

I apologise for having to intervene again on this point. Where a serious or critical incident occurs in a school the words "serious" and "critical" seem to be assigned various degrees of importance when a matter is reported. I am aware of a situation in a school where a principal reported an incident as "serious" and sought the assistance of NEPS, which was not forthcoming because the incident was not deemed "critical". It was, however, a critical incident but it was not addressed at the time. What communication system operates between school staff and the NEPS staff concerning the crises in schools, which by their nature are unplanned and have to be managed on the day? How does NEPS participate in such incidents in schools?

I understand that our visitors came here today with a view to establishing NEPS countrywide. Would it be better to look at the possibility of resourcing what exists before trying to extend a service which badly needs enhancement and to enable the people there to carry out their duties more effectively than at present?

There are two references in this report to the difficulty of assigning 35% of service delivery time to support and development work in schools. I imagine educational psychologists would appreciate more time to do this kind of work but they are obviously snowed under with requests for individual assessments. There seems to be an attempt in the development service planning to address the need to make some time for that. We hear about the issues concerning individual assessments which are crisis issues for many parents but this work is also very important. What time has NEPS found to do that kind of work?

Can Ms McCurtain give us a clear breakdown of how NEPS staff will interact with the National Educational Psychological Services whose report is quite clear on what it does? At a meeting the chief executive discussed issues such as the critical incidents and the holistic approach in dealing with absences from school, which examines why this has happened. Often the school was unsuitable because it did not have the necessary resources and the pupil needed to meet a psychologist. Can Ms McCurtain explain whether it is intended that there be clear interaction between the two groups?

I am very interested in outcomes arising from interventions in the education system, including the work of resource teachers, remedial teachers and so on. A change of attitude seems to have occurred over the past 11 or 12 years. When I was teaching I occasionally sought psychological reports, usually prepared privately, but parents were very reluctant or unwilling to carry out the recommendations in these reports. Nowadays parents have come full circle and seek access and intervention in cases where it may not be needed, although they seem to think it is. How has that change come about?

I am also interested in the outcomes of the cases of the few people whose parents I persuaded to get an assessment which concluded with dramatic recommendations, none of which were followed, yet the children seemed to do well. They are now adults and some of them are earning more than I and appear to be managing particularly well. How are outcomes measured? There was one boy on whom an educational psychologist wrote a damning report which distressed his poor mother, as it would have distressed me, yet he easily secured a third level place, without any intervention of consequence and has done very well.

Does an assessment carried out when someone is aged only six or seven projecting all kinds of difficulties remain effective and valid when she or he is 11, 16 or 18 years old? Is updating required and carried out? While there may not be enough people available to do that it seems from my long experience of dealing with children that the pace of development varies considerably and sometimes interventions are very beneficial. It would also be nice to know that all interventions are beneficial.

Ms McCurtain

Deputy Enright asked what "other recognised centres" means. That is related to a question about children who were out of school. This refers mainly to a cluster of centres such as Youthreach, junior training centres for Travellers and so on, where we do not yet have a service. We have seconded a senior psychologist to the Department's further education centre and she has been conducting a survey and providing support for the centres. She will report and feed into the staffing review due to take place at the end of our development period. We believe strongly that we should be serving these people because they have great needs and we would like to be in a position to provide that help.

A few members mentioned the shortfall in the number of psychologists. It is clear that we will not meet our target by the end of the development period in September because even if we were to initiate a new competition now it would take longer than that to come to fruition and I am disappointed by that. The disability Bill when enacted will place extra demands on us, as will the effects of the Education (Welfare) Bill. For example, the educational welfare officers also have statutory power to commission assessments.

There has been much mention of the circulars that govern special education, circular 8 of 2002 was an almost direct replacement for circular 8 of 1999. The planning group for NEPS reported with its projections in September 1998 and a month later the automatic entitlement for children with special needs to resources was announced. We knew immediately that would have serious implications for our workload and the demand for assessments and so on. I will be looking to increase the number in the system to 200 and asking for a staffing review because on the basis of other jurisdictions where the psychological services provide for children with special educational needs the psychologist to student ratio would be very different. Our numbers have to be considered at the moment within the overall Department staffing numbers and those constraints must be borne in mind.

It has been pointed out that in certain areas the shortfall is greater than in others. That is because when we started out we had vacancies in every region and we allowed the psychologists coming in to choose the region in which they would work. Some regions were just not popular.

We must bear in mind that our psychologists are already well-established professionals. They are practically all in permanent employment with good salaries. In many cases they have spouses and families working, and they do not want to move away from the area. If I ordered them to do so, they would not join NEPS. That is the kind of dilemma I have in trying to place people. However, I mentioned that five more psychologists are to join us in the new year, and I have specified that they must choose from the priority regions. We will certainly consider specifying certain regions in any future competition.

I was also asked if we have enough qualified psychologists available to us. We did not know whether they were there in Ireland until we advertised the first time. Of the approximately 300 who applied for the first competition, we were able to shortlist over 200 as being appropriately qualified. Many of those were Irish people working abroad. They were qualified educational psychologists, but there had been no opportunity for them to work in Ireland. Many people have returned to Ireland to take up employment in NEPS.

At this stage, perhaps I should say something about qualifications, since a few people asked me about them. We currently require a first or second class honours degree in psychology such that the psychologist is eligible for graduate membership of the Psychological Society of Ireland and either three years' experience working as a clinical psychologist with children or three years' experience as a qualified teacher working in a relevant area such as learning support or resource teaching. Those come on top of the basic qualification in psychology. Most applicants have very much more than that. We also insist on complete fluency in English or Irish. We do not insist on everyone being able to speak some Irish, but we insist that we have enough people with completely fluent Irish who can serve the Gaeltacht areas and the Gaelscoileanna.

That is the route that we decided to take, and it has worked out very well for us. Statutory registration is likely to come into force within the next year for a whole range of what are listed as medical professions - which does not please me too much - including psychology. There will be further safeguards for the clients when statutory registration comes into place.

The balance of work in service planning between individual casework and support and development work has been more difficult to achieve. We carried out a survey of it. The psychologists complete a journal at the end of every week, and they have a code to indicate what they have been spending their time on. At the end of the year, we can conduct a statistical analysis of that. Members can see the percentage of their whole time spent on support and development work. The figures must be doubled, since the school year is effectively half a calendar year. Two regions are spending 17% of their time overall on support and development work. That would work out at near the 35% target. However, that ranges down to 6%, or 12%, in the mid-west region. I relate that directly to the level of staffing in the region. They are having to cope with a backlog of assessment work. We have asked them to ring-fence time in their service plans for the coming year for that kind of activity.

I was asked about the task forces on dyslexia and autism in which we participated. I was also asked some other questions about autism and will talk about that now. We have prepared implementation plans on foot of both task force reports and have appointed a senior psychologist with responsibility for dyslexia and another for autism. That means that they are released from cases and are meant to spend one day a week each on that responsibility. We feel very well qualified to deal with dyslexia, but with autism we felt that we had a shortfall in training needs. Over the past two years, we have seconded ten psychologists to do a diploma course specifically for educational psychologists at the University of Birmingham.

Why did NEPS pick the University of Birmingham rather than universities in the United States or elsewhere?

Ms McCurtain

There are various training courses in autism in particular, but not so many specifically for educational psychology. The University of Birmingham was prepared to make places available to NEPS. It was largely a matter of opportunism, to be honest. We needed the training, and the opportunity came up, so we took it. We now expect the ten people trained to be resource people. They are from the different regions, and each person is the resource person for their own region. They will give advice to colleagues on case work on autism.

Do the methodologies and types of training available in Birmingham cover the whole range of training or zero in on a specific approach?

Ms McCurtain

I cannot answer regarding that specific course, but NEPS insists on training in all methodologies, so we arrange our own summer schools and seminars which cover the main methodologies such as the picture exchange communication system, or PECS, and applied behaviour analysis, or ABA.

We recently organised a North-South conference for educational psychologists. That was in October and was one of our contacts with our colleagues in the North. Representatives of all methodologies spoke at it. There was a very interesting presentation on the research findings surrounding outcomes regarding children with autistic spectrum disorders. It seems to be emerging clearly that there is not much difference in the effectiveness of the different approaches. As far as we can gather - and more research must be done on this - the important factor is that the child has focused time from a trained adult who knows about his or her condition. That seems to be what really makes the difference. People from different theoretical standpoints said the same thing during the conference.

I was also asked about the interface between the Department of Health and Children and the Department of Education and Science and the fact that some children are falling between two stools. That gives us great concern. We have had a joint working party with the health boards. It has reported, and we now have a national steering group, which has just had its first meeting. Its task is to implement the recommendations - the action plan in the report - and open up communications. It is at a national level. At local and regional level, there are many contacts between the Departments. Deputy Enright raised the case of a particular school. It is a fact that, in some cases, we are not yet in a position to take the service to certain special schools and units which would traditionally have been provided with a service by the health board or a voluntary body. We prioritise those schools, and the next time we get a psychologist in the area, we can roll out a service to them. That is all we can do at present.

There was a group of questions about the scheme for commissioning psychological assessments and the funding and the limit of assessments. The funding for that scheme is borne by NEPS. The money has come out of our pay budget because the numbers of psychologists required was slower coming on stream in the two years than was predicted. Money was left over that would have gone towards their pay and that is how the scheme for schools which do not yet have access to the service is being financed.

I agree that the limit of one psychologist per 50 students is arbitrary and is hard to justify. The only reason it was introduced was an anxiety that every school should have some access to the scheme. Some schools are better than others at getting organised and finding a psychologist.

Some of the more proactive schools could have booked a psychologist up to next Christmas, so it was felt that the introduction of a limit would ensure that everyone had some access. No such limit exists in schools served by NEPS. However, we do receive representations from schools which say another assessment is needed and these are considered and authorisation given in certain cases. A particular example is a school which would have been entitled to two assessments. There were triplets in the school who needed assessment and we were not going to choose two of the three.

I was questioned about the distribution of the panel of psychologists. It was just a voluntary initiative. We advertised for psychologists to be on the panel. As long as they are qualified we accept them and we have no control over which regions they come from. I think that covers all the questions on that issue.

We have had many questions about the circulars and the guidelines and the regulations on that. These guidelines were first drafted early in 1999. NEPS had no part in drafting the regulations so I will not attempt to justify them. However, I might be able to provide certain explanations. The figures of 3.5 or four hours or whatever are based on recommendations in the 1993 report of the special education review committee. I have no doubt that when the National Council for Special Education is operational, it will review the regulations and make new recommendations. Pending that, when we are assessing children, we tend to go along with those recommendations, because they seem to be the best guidelines we have at present. However, there are certain circumstances where, after a period of time, it is clear that the resources assigned to a particular child are insufficient. In such cases we can and do make a recommendation to the Department that the resource allocation should be increased.

There is a different issue, which is that since Christmas 2002 NEPS has been involved in looking at all the applications for additional resources. It has been asked to look at professional reports provided by outside professionals. The question we were asked was whether the data supplied in the report concern the existence of one of the listed disabilities, or not. That is the only question we have answered. An outside psychologist might have recommended five resource hours. We look at the test results and say this report is concerned with the fact that the child has a specific learning disability. Then it is the Department of Education and Science that makes the call. A specific learning disability under the guidelines recommends 2.5 hours. We would not dream of disagreeing with the recommendation of an outside professional. It would be wrong to do so. We just look at the results, having been asked a certain question.

Nobody likes getting extra work. We were asked to do it by the Secretary General and so we are doing it. However, we have contributed to the debate on the general allocation of resources. We have made our views known and the issue to be negotiated with the partners is that from the next school year schools will be given an overall allocation of resources based on the expected prevalence of disabilities. They will have much more discretion as to how they may use those resources. That is still under negotiation. That is just the general view that the committee should be aware of. NEPS recommends that.

NEPS favours a special education and needs model as opposed to a disability model. We have produced a report for the Department on that. The latest circular that has gone out to schools, No. 24 of 2003, narrows the principal's discretion to group children with disability, so that they can be educated together in small groups. This is pedagogically better practice. For example, if there are four children in a school with specific learning disability who are entitled to 2.5 hours each, the principal may put them into a group of four and they get ten hours. Alternatively, they may get one hour each individually and six hours together, so that there is much more flexibility now coming into the system.

Could Ms McCurtain give the number of the circular again?

Ms McCurtain

No. 24 of 2003.

Does that replace any similar previous circular?

Ms McCurtain

No, it is supplementary to No. 8 of 2002. It deals with rather different things, such as the roll-out of the new system, what schools do in the meantime and so on, as well as the procedures for verification.

Would it be possible to get copies of some of those circulars?

The committee should get them automatically.

Ms McCurtain

They are on the Department's website.

The fact that they physically come means that the committee is more likely to deal with them and to advert to what they contain. Ms McCurtain has covered a wide range of issues. Deputy Stanton is always asking about Middletown.

Ms McCurtain

NEPS has had nothing to do with the establishment of Middletown. It is not yet in operation, so I visited the previous facility. We have not been involved. Our colleagues from the North have been involved - that is, the principal education psychologist from the North. I really cannot contribute to that debate.

Middletown, as Ms McCurtain knows, is for children in the autistic spectrum. The idea is that children should go there for assessment. To bring small children and their parents etc. from Cahirciveen to Armagh does not make much sense. I would prefer to see regional centres close to where people live. I would like to see the local service in place first before we avail of this créme de la crème. Most of the groups involved in the task force and so on that I have questioned know nothing about it. The task force itself, when asked about it, decided that it should not happen. It is not included in the task force recommendations. Indeed the task force was appalled by the idea.

NEPS, which is at the cutting edge of this whole area, has not been involved. I just do not know what is going on. The more we try to find out the less we know. Ms McCurtain's views on the issue would be interesting if she was prepared to give them.

There is an expectation that it will be beneficial to your service or service users here. There is an aspiration to develop best practice, is there not?

Ms McCurtain

We recently made a submission. We were not asked for it but we supplied it. We see great potential for use as a centre for training professionals and ancillary staff. That is what we would like to see developed there regardless.

You made a point earlier in response to a question from Deputy Stanton about intervention in the lives of children who are in the autistic spectrum. That it did not seem to matter greatly which of the systems was in use in intervention by a trained person is what I believe you said. I presume the quality of training of the person involved would have an enormous impact on the outcome, or is there a finding that lay people can receive a level of training that makes their intervention useful?

Ms McCurtain

Ideally, people will be very well trained for dealing with autistic spectrum disorders, but people who do not have such lengthy training can often cope if there is a clearly defined programme which enables them to be aware of what they must do at all times. Having said that, it is essential that a trained teacher is involved as they know about adapting curricula as different reactions arise in particular children. I am not a particular expert in the area of autistic spectrum disorder. I simply know what I have learnt from my own reading and attendance at seminars and conferences. People in the organisation have a good level of expertise.

Deputy Curran asked some questions on assessments, namely, whether the backlog of assessment work would ever even out. All the evidence from other jurisdictions is that it never does. Obviously, younger children are coming up all the time. We have to move to the stage model that is outlined in our model of service leaflet and particularly to engage in preventative work with schools and training work with teachers so that they know how to deal with the range of needs. Obviously we will still be available as there are always individual children who need to be assessed.

That relates to Deputy Stanton's question.

On that issue, the Minister for Education and Science told us recently that he was concerned. We spoke about what I saw as the explosion of support, which is welcome and is not a matter I am criticising. He informed us that the numbers amounted to 11% of children in Ireland who receive some kind of support in the form of a special needs or support teacher, whereas the European norm is around 3%. If I am paraphrasing him correctly, he was arguing that we are being too generous in our supports. Obviously I do not agree with that, but it begs the question as to why there is such a difference, if there is any, between the European norm of 3% and 11% here. Is there a system failure? I do not accept the theory that there is an Irish gene that causes this, although I am aware that it is being proposed. Why do children in Ireland appear to need support in such significant numbers compared to the rest of Europe? Also, on the issue of intervention and assistance at pre-school level, has the witness a view or a role in that area?

The witness will be aware of the findings of the Highlands Education Council on the numbers presenting in the alternate spectrum and the very dramatic increases during the term in which measurements have been available to them, which is actually a very short period, and whether that is likely to be indicative.

In regard to the staged approach, I am in possession of a circular which, in the appendix, gives us the different stages. Stage one covers two terms where the class teacher deals with the child but can receive advice from a psychologist. It is only at a later stage that the psychological report may be compiled. Is the witness saying that there is some flexibility in that? In practice it is important that schools are aware of that, where they clearly have a child with problems who is going to need more intervention than other children. This circular is not very clear on informing schools that they can have an assessment from the beginning if that is considered necessary. Is that the witness's interpretation?

Ms McCurtain

Yes, it is. That is the kind of matter that would be discussed in the annual planning meeting and explained to school staff, that there is a fast forward system. Of course some children cause such problems that they need to be seen almost immediately. That is why I have asked the psychologists to build into their service planning time some contingency days to enable them to accept urgent referrals as soon as is necessary. Perhaps it is explained more clearly in our model of service leaflet rather than in the circular.

I was asked about the levels of disability between the figures of 3% and 11%, which all relate to what one defines as disability. The figure of 3% is relatively constant when it refers to the low incidence serious disabilities, such as moderate and severe general learning disability, sensory impairments, autism spectrum disorders, which is probably nearer to the figure of 3%.

In Ireland, specific learning disability has been defined as a disability, which it is not in other countries. They are classed as children needing learning support rather than children needing more intensive intervention. There really is not that much difference in the incidence. Our own screening project in the north-west and north-east of Ireland is beginning to produce figures for what we might expect the prevalence to be. The figure of 11% is based on our planning group report which was simply extrapolated from international research. It is largely an estimate.

It appears that the current review was initiated because of those figures and that the Minister felt the resources could be better focused, and even that there were resources available that were not needed at all. This is where the concern arose. There are many parents concerned about this and the way the entire area is being approached where people seem to be refused service and assistance now when they would not have been in the past. Is there a tightening of the provision of service from the witness's experience?

Ms McCurtain

As far as our professional practice is concerned, there has not been any change. We assess the needs of children and recommend what we believe is appropriate for them. There is concern that there has been an over-allocation of resources in some schools. For example, resources have not been taken back since 1999 until recently. In the nature of things, some of the children receiving resources must have left the schools. That is one obvious example of the kind of matter we are looking at.

The witness is referring to pre-school intervention.

Ms McCurtain

Yes, pre-school. At the moment, NEPS does not have a mandate to work with children at pre-school. Obviously we would love to do that as professionals and hope that it will be addressed when the staffing review takes place. Under the Education for Persons with Disabilities Bill 2003, it will be very difficult to resist doing that.

IQ scores are suspect, of course. NEPS practice would be to say the score probably ranges between this and that, but with a circular list one cannot do that. No individual tests are standardised on the Irish population. We are working on British or American standardisations which is rather worrying. However, it is expensive to standardise an intelligence test, given the size of our population.

With regard to the disadvantaged and in particular the Traveller community where we are concerned that IQ scores are totally misleading, a system of "positive profiles" is being developed, which is a system that focuses on what the child or young person can do and their attainments. We have a proposal for a research project to evaluate the relevance of that and train teachers in its use. It is primarily aimed at Traveller children but it could have a great impact on children who come from disadvantaged backgrounds generally.

Would NEPS do that on its own or in conjunction with one of the colleges?

Ms McCurtain

We are in partnership with the Department of Education and Science's social inclusion and in-career development units and the Church of Ireland College of Education.

The Chairman asked a question about assessing a child at six or seven and whether that would be a reliable figure. No, it would not. I said something about the reliability of IQ scores for any child under eight. There should be a reassessment when the child is over eight years. Even then one could not be sure.

I am concerned about the transmission of decisions to parents. They are given documents full of legalese referring to this circular and that statutory instrument, etc. It does not make sense to anybody and just upsets people. Could that be made more user-friendly and documents made more understandable and more respectful even? A person concerned about his or her child may need help and just gets this refusal, like a solicitor's letter.

Ms McCurtain

I sympathise with the distress of parents and I have spoken to many of them on the phone over the past year. The problem is that it is not NEPS that makes the resource allocation. It is a special education section and it has been sending out a letter, which I agree is computer generated and looks very bald on perusal. That is purely due to pressure of work in the section, as I know. I hope that parents will not have that experience with the new system because of decisions made at school level and discussed with them.

Shall I go on to say something about parents? I was asked about families and so on.

Ms McCurtain has been talking for well over half an hour with relatively few interventions, which ultimately makes her answering requirement even longer.

We have a document here and I would like a comment from Ms McCurtain on the critical incidents in schools and the structure within which NEPS works in the event.

Ms McCurtain

The Deputy raised a point earlier about what was considered serious. It is serious if it has an impact on the children in the school and the teachers, rather than the power and importance of the incident in itself. In one case the burning down of a resource room was traumatic for the school concerned.

The Deputy mentioned an issue where help had not been forthcoming. I was sorry to hear about that. We have now appointed a senior psychologist with responsibility for the co-ordination of critical incidents. If the school has difficulties, she is the person to approach and she might be able to help, centrally, on that. The normal structure is that if the school has a NEPS psychologist, it will contact him or her. Anyone in the Department who hears about a critical incident, whether from the inspectorate or an administrative section, will tell NEPS immediately also. If it is a school that does not have a service from NEPS, it should contact our headquarters and we will put it in touch with the person who can help.

Are there are other issues that have not been addressed? It has been really interesting. Considerable progress has been made in the whole area. It is much wider than had been anticipated, particularly as regards the critical incident element, which one only tends to know about if one is familiar with a particular case. The committee is happy enough, so I would thank Ms McCurtain for her initial presentation, the documentation and in particular for her 37-minute response during which all the points were dealt with.

The joint committee adjourned at 1.35 p.m.sine die.
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