Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 23 April 2024
306. Deputy Matt Carthy asked the Minister for Education if she will examine the process for schools to appeal their allocation of special education teaching hours considering the current burden on schools of completing a comprehensive appeal form, followed by a school visit and a full school review places an excessive pressure on school staff; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [17760/24]
View answerI would like to thank the Deputy for question raised.
Enabling children with special educational needs to receive an education is a priority for this government. The vast majority of children with special educational needs are supported to attend mainstream classes with their peers.
The Special Education Teaching (SET) allocation model for 2024/25 is based on information from all 4,000 schools in the country. The model distributes the total available number of SET posts in line with each school’s profile of need.
The model seeks to distribute teaching resources in the fairest possible manner, taking into account as much evidence as possible in respect of individual schools and evidence in respect of the best possible use of resources. Schools must adhere to the guidance on the use of SET hours and support all children with additional teaching needs using the continuum of support framework.
The revised model is providing an annual allocation of SET teaching hours, using the best possible available data sources and is ensuring that the right resource is available at the right time to meet the needs of children with special educational needs.
The National Council for Special Education (NCSE) has responsibility for planning and coordinating school supports for children with special educational needs including SET reviews.
The NCSE have advised that they have reviewed and streamline the SET review process following feedback from schools and our education partners. The new streamlined review process was introduced for the SET Allocation for 2024/25 school year. A school could request a review of their allocation on the NCSE portal in March 2024 and the NCSE has committed to completing the reviews in the period March to May 2024 on a prioritised bases with rapidly developing schools being given priority.
When a review application under a category outlined in circular 02 or 03/2024 the NCSE requests the school to provide the minimal amount of additional data from the school. All such data requested by the NCSE to progress the review is information that should already be to hand in the relevant school and the only additional requirement is to ensure that all relevant individual student data is anonymised.
For example, if a school applies for a review under the category of a significant increase in the intake or population of pupils at primary level who have the greatest level of need in line with the Continuum of Support, the additional data being requested by the NCSE is as follows:
1. The Current Support Plan for each relevant pupil in the category
2. Most recent Support Plan Review for each relevant pupil in category
3. SET and Class teachers timetables
All the required information above, should already be readily available in the school as outline in the SET Guidelines issued in 2017 and in adherence with the continuum of support requirements to support students with additional needs. The data required should already be maintained in the school as it has to be utilised by the school to identify the pupil’s additional learning needs and the timetables are required as part of the schools resource management.
In addition, the NCSE provides a template to the school (SET Review Additional Information Form) to allow school to provide additional information which may not have been included in their original application.
It is important to note that where an onsite review may be required, this would only consist of one visit to the school by the NCSE to review the information already held by the school.
It is important to note that SET hours are only one component of support for children in mainstream but the most important support is the mainstream class teacher. The pupil teacher ratio at primary level is now 23:1 which means there are more mainstream teachers than ever before in our educational system. There will be 14,600 Special Education Teachers (SETs) supporting mainstream classes in the 2024/25 school year, which is an increase of 1,000 since the end of the 2021 school year. This is the highest number of SET teachers ever in our schools.
