Finian McGrath
Ceist:23. Deputy Finian McGrath asked the Minister for Education and Skills the status of the provision of resources hours for children with a disability in primary schools. [43915/15]
Amharc ar fhreagraWednesday, 9 December 2015
Ceisteanna (23)
Freagraí scríofa
The NCSE has allocated 6832 Resource Teaching posts to mainstream schools this year. This is an increase of 29% in the allocation since 2011.
3965 of these posts have been allocated to primary schools, which is an increase of 11% over the allocation made last year.
The General Allocation Model (GAM) is now updated annually for all primary schools, to take account of increased enrolments. 4273 GAM posts have been allocated to primary schools this year to provide additional supports for pupils with learning needs and mild general learning difficulties.
The NCSE recommend that a new model for allocating resource teachers to schools should be introduced which would allow the allocation of resources to pupils based on actual learning needs rather than on a diagnosis of disability.
A pilot of this new model is taking place in a number of schools over the course of the current school year.