Fidelma Healy Eames (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The witnesses are very welcome. I apologise for missing their presentation. I hope they have noticed an appreciable difference in the special needs assistant system in the past two years. We did a great deal of work on it here two years ago because we were at crisis point at that stage. I would like to hear a "Yes" or "No" response from the witnesses to that comment.

Our focus of concern is the special needs child, and the SNA is our current model for mainstreaming. Have the witnesses examined other models? Members of the education committee during the last term travelled to the United Kingdom and examined what was being done in the area of special needs education there. They were using a teaching assistant model. That teaching assistant was full-time and assigned to a specific number of teachers. We should examine, as was said, the care and learning needs of the child. I used to supervise teacher education and I saw many SNAs in classrooms and the child was looking around or holding their hand. I do not believe that model is adequate. If there is a human being in the classroom with a teacher, that person should be upskilled enough to work to provide for all of the needs of the special needs child in the classroom. We could be blindfolded here in saying the SNA model, as it is framed, is the correct, full and wholesome one to meet all needs. Have the witnesses examined other models in other jurisdictions that could better serve the needs of the child?