David Cullinane
Ceist:288. Deputy David Cullinane asked the Minister for Education and Skills if his attention has been drawn to the application by a school (details supplied) for a special education teacher allowance. [35340/17]
Amharc ar fhreagraWednesday, 26 July 2017
Ceisteanna (288)
Freagraí scríofa
I wish to advise the Deputy that DES Circular 0013/2017 for primary schools and 0014/2017 for post primary schools were published on 7th March 2017.
These Circulars set out the details of the new model for allocating special education teachers to schools.
The revised allocation process replaces the generalised allocation process at primary and post primary school level for learning support and high incidence special educational needs, and the National Council for Special Education (NCSE) allocation process which provided additional resource teaching supports to schools, to support pupils assessed as having Low Incidence disabilities.
The new Special Education Teaching allocation provides a single unified allocation for special educational support teaching needs to each school, based on each school’s educational profile.
Allocations based on the school profiles were issued to all schools on 7th March. Details of the special education teaching allocations have also been published on the NCSE website.
The aim of this new model is to deliver better outcomes for children with special educational needs. Substantial research, analysis, consultation with service users and stakeholders, and piloting have gone in to the development of this model and all of the evidence points to the fact that this new system will deliver better outcomes for children.
No school, including the school to which the Deputy has referred, will lose supports as a result of the implementation of the new model. In addition, no school will receive an allocation, for the support of pupils with complex needs, less than the allocation they received to support such pupils during the 2016/17 school year.
An additional 900 teaching posts have been provided to support the introduction of this new allocation model. The provision of an additional 900 teaching posts is a very significant investment in the provision of additional teaching support for pupils with special educational needs in our schools. This is additional to an increase of 41% in the number of resource teachers allocated to schools annually by the NCSE since 2011.
The additional funding will provide additional supports to over 1200 schools who are identified as needing additional supports as a result of the new model. Supports for children with special educational needs is a key priority for this Government. The new funding will ensure that all schools receive a sufficient allocation of special education needs resources to provide additional teaching support to all pupils, including pupils who have yet to enrol in their school, who require such support.
In relation to the particular school referred to by the Deputy, under the old allocation model, this school had a Learning Support allocation of 10 hours for the 2016/17 school year, which combined with 8.50 resource teaching hours allocated to the school by the National Council for Special Education, gave a total allocation to the school of 18.50 additional teaching hours for the 2016/17 school year.
The profiled allocation for the school, including the additional baseline provision, for 2017/18 amounts to 15 hours in total. However, the school has maintained its existing level of allocation of 18.50 hours which includes a retained amount of 3.50 and a baseline amount of 1.83 hours. Accordingly, the school has been allocated some 5.33 hours more than its profile indicates.
Under the new allocation model, schools are provided with a total allocation to meet the needs of all children in the school who have special educational needs.
Under the new model resources are based on each school’s profile, to provide supports immediately to those pupils who need it without delay. This will reduce the administrative burden on schools as schools will no longer have to complete an application process annually and apply for newly enrolled pupils who require resource hours. Children who need support can have that support provided immediately rather than having to wait for a diagnosis.
Schools will therefore no longer have to make applications, for newly enrolled pupils for whom resource teaching hours may have been provided under the old model, or for pupils who have received a new diagnosis, as schools will now receive a single allocation for all of their special education teaching needs, based on their school size and profile.
The new allocations to schools will include provision to support all pupils in the schools, including pupils who may receive a diagnosis after the allocation is received by a school, or where there are newly enrolling pupils to the school.
All allocations to schools include a supplementary provision, which has been referred to as the ‘baseline allocation’ which is allocated over and above the profiled allocation.
For students who start school from September 2017, with a specific diagnosis, either in junior infants or transferring from another school, the resources they need will already be in the school under the new model.
The NCSE published details of an appeals process on the NCSE website: www.ncse.ie whereby schools could appeal whether the data used to calculate their school profile was correct and complete and whether it was correctly applied in the calculation of their 2017/18 allocation.
Schools who wished to appeal were asked to submit appeals March 31st 2017.
DES Circulars 0013/2017 and 0014/2017 outlined the basis on which the Education Research Centre determined the allocations for all schools.
In advance of the submission of an appeal, schools were asked to read carefully the DES circulars and in particular the relevant section, which relate to the breakdown of the allocation, which may be under consideration for appeal.
The NCSE will advise schools of the outcome of the appeals as soon as possible. The NCSE has confirmed that the school referred to in this question has not submitted an appeal.
The model will allow for some additional provision for Developing schools or where a school’s enrolment levels increase very substantially prior, beyond what would be expected through normal demographic growth, prior to the next review of the model. The DES is currently developing the criteria in this regard and schools will be notified of the qualifying criteria for this in the coming weeks.
The model will also allow for some additional provision for exceptional circumstances or emergency circumstances arising over the course of the model. The NCSE, through its regional support services, will support schools in managing their special education teaching allocations in the first instance. Only in very exceptional circumstances, where it can be demonstrated that the schools profile has changed very significantly since the allocation was made to the school, may consideration be given to an additional allocation of hours be made to the school.
Guidelines for schools on the organisation, deployment and use of their special education teachers to address the need of pupils with special educational needs have also now been published and are available on my Department's website.
The Guidelines will support schools to reflect on how they can review and manage their timetabling practices to ensure the timetable is sufficiently flexible to meet the needs of all pupils in their school who have special needs. The Guidelines encourage schools to ensure they deploy their resources appropriately to meet the needs of all of the children in their school who require additional teaching support, including pupils with emerging needs, or new entrants.