Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 28 June 2016
46. Deputy Bernard J. Durkan asked the Minister for Education and Skills his proposals to meet the special needs school place requirements at primary and secondary level and if he plans to ensure the availability of the relevant number of teachers and special needs assistants in the next five years; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [18260/16]
View answerI wish to advise the Deputy that funding for special education provision in 2016 will amount to some €1.5 billion, which is equivalent to over 17% of the gross overall current allocation for education and training. It has increased by 10% in the past two years.
The investment which is being made to support children with special educational needs is an area of spending which has been prioritised above most other areas by this Government.
The policy of my Department is that children with special educational needs should be included where possible and appropriate in mainstream placements with additional supports provided. In circumstances where children with special educational need require more specialised interventions, special school or special class places are also available.
Children, therefore, have a number of placement options including mainstream placement with support, placement in a special class in a mainstream school or placement in a special class in a special school.
We now have the highest level of Special Needs Assistant (SNA) support, Resource Teaching allocations and Special Class provision that we have ever had, which will ensure that children with special educational needs can continue to participate in education and be supported in a manner appropriate to their needs.
I recently announced that from September next 12,900 Special Needs Assistants (SNAs) will be available for allocation to primary and secondary schools, which is 860 more posts, or a 7% increase, in the number of posts over which were available last year. In total the number of SNA posts available has increased by almost 22% from 10,575 posts available in 2011.
There are currently over 11,800 learning support and Resource Teacher posts in mainstream primary and post primary schools providing additional teaching support to pupils with special educational needs.
In May of this year the National Council for Special Education (NCSE) allocated 7,015 Resource Teaching posts to mainstream schools for September 2016, which is an increase of approximately 9% over the number allocated at September 2015.
In total, 7,452 resource teacher posts will be available for allocation to schools for 2016/17, which represents an increase of 41% from 5,265 posts available in 2011.
In addition, approximately 150 new Special Classes will be opened for the 2016/17 school year, which means there will be over 1,150 special classes in place, compared to 548 special classes in 2011.
The NCSE, through its network of local Special Educational Needs Organisers (SENOs) will continue to engage with schools in order to plan for, and to open, new special classes each year, in order to ensure there are sufficient special class placements available at primary and post primary school level to meet demand in a given area.
125 special schools also provide specialist education for those pupils who need it.
The provision which is being made ensures that children with special educational needs can continue to participate in education and be supported in a manner appropriate to their needs.
As funding for the provision of special educational needs supports for future years will be considered annually, as part of the annual estimates process, I am not in a position to set out details of the anticipated provision for children with special educational needs for the future five year period. However, I can confirm that this Government will continue to ensure that the supports required to ensure that all children with special educational needs can continue to participate in education will be provided.
