Jennifer Carroll MacNeill (Dún Laoghaire, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Yes, especially on the psychological side and supporting behaviours. That is the point that has been raised again and again to me. There is another issue that is also being raised with the special schools and the teacher training more generally, though I appreciate the latter is not the NCSE's direct remit. Teachers when they are being trained get a two-week placement in a special school but they do not prepare a lesson plan or do any of the things they might do in an equivalent way for any other school. Therefore, you have teachers being produced every year by the colleges of education who are not necessarily equipped to take over special classes within the schools. You do not see a career progression for teachers within mainstream schools to take over special classes and it is being left, one has a sense, to the designs of the individual principal about finding somebody who has either the experience or the desire to do that. However, if we do not have teachers coming out who are equipped to deal with children with additional needs in all forms then that is going to be much more difficult.