Ms Catriona Galster:

I was at home full-time with my children while they were growing up. I came in contact with an autistic child and I was completely fascinated by her and everything about her, so I did a course in the College of Progressive Education, which was an online course at the time, and I became an SNA in 2008. I have since studied a lot of courses, not just on autism, although that is my principal interest. I have also just completed the UCD course and I would back everything that Ms O’Sullivan said. It was an excellent course. I would love it if there was a pathway from that course on to doing a full degree. I agree with Mr. Pike that the level of education involved is probably level 7 or level 8, but maybe that would be a component part.

Having worked as an SNA, I feel the whole area of inclusion, on which the Minister of State, Deputy Madigan, has a ministerial remit, does not just apply to the student body but also applies to the whole school community – principals, teachers, caretakers, SNAs and cleaners - and they are all entitled to feel they belong in the workplace. In order to belong and to feel connected to others, there must be mutual respect. There is no place for hierarchies. There is certainly no place for schools where a significant number of staff are made to feel they are very firmly at the bottom of the ladder and that is where they are going to stay, or that they are a resource to be used at the discretion of the principal in order to carry out a variety of inappropriate or meaningless tasks which have nothing to do with students. That is something I know drives SNAs crazy. Inclusion must encompass full understanding among staff and students of the different roles the staff members have and a greater respect for the need for all staff to work together in order for that inclusive school to prosper into the future. The whole area of inclusion is something we are probably only at the very beginning of, but it involves collaboration, not hierarchy.