Ms Eileen O'Rourke:

The NABMSE welcomes the opportunity to speak on this issue. We represent the boards of management of special schools and mainstream schools with special classes. Our schools work with and support students with special educational needs, SEN, from four years of age to 18 years of age with mild, moderate, severe and profound disabilities, with autism, with social, emotional and behavioural difficulties, SEBD, and also with complex medical needs. Meaningful access to education and the physical and emotional well-being of our students are always central considerations of our boards of management.

The NABMSE considers that school mental health services are wholly inadequate at post-primary level where students consistently need to be referred to outside agencies for support, where they remain on lengthy waiting lists, even when in crisis.

This happens because the availability and allocation of qualified counsellors to schools is utterly inadequate given the rise in levels of anxiety, depression, self-harm, suicide ideation, eating disorders, body dysphoria, gender dysphoria and so on among teenagers today. These are significant issues that, if not addressed early and appropriately, will lead to lifelong difficulties for each of these individuals.

There is no access to mental health services at primary level or in the special educational context. Even in a crisis situation, for example, where students talking about suicide and self-harming, the National Educational Psychological Service, NEPS, is unable to provide any form of concrete support. Why do we not have suitably qualified child counsellors in primary schools and special schools as members of school staff? Many children’s difficulties could then be identified and that child could be given early support, thus cutting down on more urgent need for intervention when things have significantly deteriorated for that child. Sadly, when a critical incident occurs in a school in Ireland, NEPS is only allowed to provide support to the teachers at that school. Its intervention is designed to assist teachers in counselling and supporting the other children in a school, for example, where their friend has died. In a special school, staff include teachers, SNAs, care workers, nurses, part-time teachers and bus escorts. All these staff develop friendships with the pupils and often becoming the first confidante when concerns or difficulties arise.

In the case of a critical incident, for example, when a child who attends a special school passes away, which happens often in schools where students have complex medical needs, the other pupils and parents understandably become frightened and disorientated. Their lives are shaken by the enormity of death. For children, the concept of death - the "never again" - is difficult to comprehend. SNAs, bus escorts and all the other support staff are not provided with training by the Departments of Education or Health. The role of trainer and identification of training needs is left to the board of management, principal and teachers in an individual school.

NABMSE, calls for an immediate review of the critical incident policy in schools in Ireland. This review must examine how counsellors can be deployed to special schools in emergencies. We need counsellors with specialised training who can work with children, develop staff skills and assist parents with coping mechanisms. We need to provide direct training to all the support staff surrounding children in special schools.

School attendance is an important contributor to the well-being and general mental wellness of our students. A small percentage of pupils with special educational needs disengage from school for a variety of reasons and others miss substantial time in school due to prolonged illnesses and hospitalisation. These pupils need to know there is a future for them in further and higher education. Supports must be put in place early enough to prevent this drop-out or disengagement, which prevents these students with additional needs from ever having the opportunity to engage with further education or training.

NABMSE also suggests the need to appoint special school liaison teachers who can support families who are often under extreme pressure coping with a child with complex needs. This teacher would support the children and families in liaising with other agencies, and the positive link with the school could help maintain their child’s attendance, positive engagement and achievement in school. In NABMSE’s opinion, the concept of lifelong learning needs to be resourced as early as possible for all pupils presenting with special educational needs in our system.

Our members' board of management reports that it is difficult to co-ordinate services with the HSE and Department of Education, despite the fact there are established and historical links between them. We understand that pilot programmes are a way of examining how links can be strengthened. We are, however, concerned that many pupils in our schools across the country suffer silently without support as they have no interventions for as long as pilot studies takes place elsewhere. We call for an immediate review of all existing pilot programmes with a view to extending interventions and supports to all pupils with special educational needs. A strong, consistent, accessible multidisciplinary approach has been severely lacking to date.

As I said, a small group of children with additional and special needs disengage from school for a number of reasons. These can be health, family issues, cultural misunderstanding on the part of the school and staff and mental health issues. We suggest a special school liaison teacher in every special school, continued support for distance learning and the provision of targeted learning to students who cannot attend due to illness, vulnerability, school refusal and mental health issues. We also call for cultural awareness training for all our staff in our schools as there is a need for emphasis on knowledge, acceptance and celebration of different cultures and blending these cultures into our everyday learning.

We also need to ensure that students work with other students and look at how groups are formed. We must develop flexibilities so that students are involved in a wide range of activities and, therefore, in more peer groups. Children with emotional difficulties currently do not have proper access to psychiatric services. NABMSE believes this service, along with counselling in schools, needs to be an urgent focus for the Department.