Mr. John Kearney:

I am delighted to meet the Deputy in her current position and engage with her at this level. I commend her on the various inputs she made to teaching and learning in schools in County Cavan.

I assure the Deputy and other committee members that the NCSE has quite a comprehensive database. It is a five-year forecasting model, as such, which projects ahead in terms of placements required. At any given time we have a county-by-county analysis of placements required built on weekly meetings with the Department to project future placement requirements. Enrolment is an ongoing process, particularly in and out of special class placements, and those six students in a class could keep changing.

Based on our weekly meetings with the Department and the geographic information system that it shares with us, we have managed the demand on a county-by-county basis and we are confident we have the capacity to address emerging needs arising between now and September. We have narrowed this to the Dublin region with respect to 50 special school placements and 56 special class placements. We are quite confident in the data we manage, notwithstanding the fluidity of the enrolment processes. That enables us to accommodate and deliver on the projected need.

It is not perfect for a minute in that there are anomalies. Our first focus is very much on delivering against need so each and every student with special educational needs is provided with a special class placement in this country. We achieve this, by and large, and we have identified hotspots in Dublin that were well publicised recently. We are also focusing on moving in time so students would travel to local schools in local catchment areas. At this time, we are confident in the data and the management of that around places.