Ms Teresa Griffin:

I thank the committee for its invitation to attend this afternoon's meeting. I am accompanied by my colleague, Niall Feeney, assistant principal in the NCSE. I am pleased to have the opportunity to contribute further to the committee's discussions on the role of the SNA and to provide an update since we last met in October 2013.

As advised previously, the NCSE is a very strong supporter of the SNA scheme. Without SNA support, many students would be unable to attend school. The scheme provides sufficient support to meet a student's care needs but also allows for this support to be faded over time in line with a student's development. The scheme also facilitates maintained or increased levels of support where this is needed.

The NCSE initially allocated 10,985 SNA posts to schools for last September, the start of the current school year. Since then, over 165 posts have been allocated in response to needs which emerged during the year. There are now some 11,150 SNA posts in schools. More than two thirds of these are in mainstream class settings.

Members might recall that at the last meeting, I outlined that the role of the SNA had been informally expanded by some schools to include an educational remit. Some parents, schools and professionals consider that an SNA is allocated to help with literacy difficulties or to provide therapeutic support, such as speech and language therapy. Often, when SNA care support is being faded out or withdrawn completely, a school might advise that they would like the SNA to do other work with a student such as working on improving a student's language, literacy, numeracy and so on.

In the 2014-15 school year, the NCSE processed 8,500 applications for SNA support. Of these, 3,000 or 35% did not come within the remit of the SNA scheme for these and other reasons. In the NCSE, we find this to be very worrying because each application for SNA support raises expectations and hopes, and when the applications are declined there can be disappointment, anxiety, sometimes even anger, and a belief that the NCSE is not doing its job properly or that "cuts" are the reason for non-allocation. This is not the case. In fact, the number of SNAs has increased by over 600 since 2013.

One of the issues being discussed is whether we should have teaching assistants. From time to time there is a suggestion that the role of the SNA should be expanded to include the provision of additional educational support to students with special needs. As a general rule, the NCSE considers the issue of whether to have teaching assistants to be much broader than special education. The conclusions of the research I referenced at our last meeting on the matter still remain relevant. The research studies I raised, which I have circulated again for the committee's convenience, raise serious concerns about the effectiveness of teaching assistant support for students with special educational needs. While finding some positive effects on teachers' workload and stress levels, these studies found the more support students received from teaching assistants the less progress they made in subjects such as English, mathematics and science; students with special educational needs spent over a quarter of their school time away from mainstream class, their teachers and peers; they were almost constantly accompanied by a teacher assistant who bore the greatest responsibility for planning and for teaching them; students could become over-dependent on teacher assistant support and socially isolated from other students; and despite the good intentions of teaching assistants, students with special educational needs received a less appropriate and lower quality educational experience than other students.

All of us are striving to ensure that Irish students with special educational needs do not receive a less appropriate or lower quality educational experience. One US study noted that the substantial increase in teacher assistant use in US schools had taken place without any compelling evidence that it is "educationally sound to deploy the least qualified personnel to provide primary instruction to students with the most complex learning characteristics". On the other hand, research findings consistently demonstrate a strong relationship between the quality of teaching, and the role of the teacher, and outcomes achieved by this group of students. As I said, I re-circulated some extracts from various research literature for members' information.

The NCSE provided policy advice to the Minister which takes on board the research findings and international best practice principles. The NCSE considers that there is insufficient evidence, at this point in time, to support the introduction of a new teaching assistant grade to work specifically with students with special educational needs. The research findings indicate that paraprofessionals can act as a barrier to a student's access to the teacher and full participation in classroom activities, and that it is the quality of teaching which determines better educational outcomes.

To conclude, while there is a very important role for the SNA in supporting the care needs of students, and the NCSE is a strong supporter of the SNA scheme, the NCSE believes that students with complex learning needs should be taught by fully qualified and experienced teachers equipped with the necessary skills to meet their needs. In our 2013 policy advice, Supporting Students with Special Educational Needs, the NCSE recognised the importance and centrality of the teacher in the education and care of all students, including students with special educational needs. Research findings consistently indicate that the quality of teachers and their teaching are the most important factors in determining educational outcomes for students with special needs.

The NCSE is very concerned that parents sometimes are not sure about the SNA scheme or are not sure how the educational system supports children with special educational needs. For some time we have been producing leaflets for parents, such as the one I have with me, to provide information to parents and guardians. This one relates to young people with a disability. However, we have just printed an information leaflet for parents and guardians of children and young people with special educational needs and I will leave some copies with the Chairman.