Professor Sue Buckley:

I will begin with the position in the United Kingdom and be as succinct as possible.

I suspect different models can work equally well. I should probably point out that the assessment systems used in various countries are different. Therefore, in terms of identifying a child's profile of needs, I do not know when I last saw an IQ test score for a child in the United Kingdom. There is not the same kind of rigid structure when it comes to allocation. Ireland is moving towards this. We have statements on children with the highest degree of disability which set out the point to which their motor and speech and language skills have developed and indicate whether they have hearing impairments. They also describe their developmental needs and how these are going to impact on their education. In deciding the number of support hours and on the direction in which money might travel, it is what Ireland is moving towards, namely, a description of special educational needs, not just diagnosis. As pointed out, diagnosis might be very important in setting the scene in this regard.

As is the case in Ireland, in the United Kingdom much more money has been allocated directly to schools. Like the general allocation model which obtains here, much more money is now available in schools in the United Kingdom. This is a recognition of the fact that 20% of the school population have additional educational needs and that some 18% of these have always been in mainstream schools. This reflects the bigger picture in having a flexible school system for all children. As a result - as is the case here - much more money has gone straight to schools in the United Kingdom.

There are virtually no children with Down's syndrome in the United Kingdom - even those with higher IQs - in respect of whom statements have not been compiled. Typically, they definitely qualify for a statement. I would be prepared to state 99% of them have statements. These statements list their needs, including some that might come from the area of health - for example, speech and language therapy or physiotherapy - and identify the level of assistant support the child will receive and, possibly, the services of incoming support staff from outside the school system. Having stated a child should receive 20 hours of support assistance - I will come back to this - it may also be decided that the school already has enough money to pay for 12 hours. A little more money will go to it, in the same way that low-incidence funding is allocated here.

Some money already will be in one's school system to fund such additional time. However, the other thing members need to know is the way in which schools have changed in the United Kingdom. The drive for this inclusion started in the mid-1980s, as it did here. I have been coming here to run training since the mid-1980s and I should tell the joint committee how impressed I am about how rapidly the Irish system has progressed and developed and has welcomed children in inclusive settings. While the same thing has been happening in the United Kingdom, one important development was the introduction in 1981 of statements of special educational needs. This comprised getting rid of the diagnosis and listing the child's special educational needs. Very quickly thereafter, people realised there was insufficient expertise in special education in schools and as I am sure members are aware, all schools, primary and secondary, must have a special educational needs co-ordinator, who increasingly might be called the head of learning support. This person is a member of staff with full or part-time responsibility for special education for all the children, which entails reviewing their statements, doing their individual educational plans, IEPs, every year and, importantly, training and supporting assistants and teachers in school. This would be a bit like having one of your special education resource teachers permanently in school.

In addition, members probably are aware that over the years, we have built an army of what we now call teaching assistants. When we started in 1988, the teachers in the reception year classes who were getting the five year-olds had never had an adult in the classroom. They actually were more worried about the assistant coming in with the child than the child with Down's syndrome. While we of course have come a long way from there, at the time the view was that one would not be able to support this little tot with delayed motor issues, delayed communication and therefore a tendency, if not properly supported, to start challenging behaviours without another adult in the classroom. As members are aware, this provision has grown and as a result, many of our primary schools have as many teaching assistants as teachers. I believe I am correct in stating that in most of our primary schools in respect of reception year, year one and year two, there always is a teaching assistant plus a teacher for all the children. This is before anything to do with a child with an additional need. A group of these have been built up, which is critical. It involves both expert teaching and supporting the class teacher. Any teaching the teaching assistant does for individual children or small groups is under the direction of a teacher and that is how it works.