Ms Helen Walsh:

Circular 80/2024 is very clear, perhaps for the first time, on the eligibility criteria that govern students' access to special classes. It is being improved upon in Circular 39/2025. The assumption in NEPS is that a student is able to access mainstream. To a certain extent, the assumption within Irish education is that a student can go to mainstream placement. Special class or special school eligibility is then determined by the level of complex needs. Circular 80/2024 outlined this, which was not simply the diagnosis of autism or the presence of complex needs but a rationale as to why this particular placement is required. Those three elements together form and determine the eligibility. If evidence of complex needs is not there - the diagnosis for the most part is there - alongside the rationale as to why a student should not be within a mainstream place, eligibility was not determined in that context. Our later circular, Circular 39/2025, also added the element that the student must be known to the NCSE. That is to join up planning and enrolment and for all of us to ensure that the national agency knows the students who will be placed within that context. Outside those criteria, there would not be a reason I could see why eligibility would not be determined. It very much depends on the nature of the report and the context of that report.