Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The reasons for moving to the other system are outlined in my reply. The council responsible for special education needs feels resources are required for children to be professionally assessed, but the parents of many children are unable to afford that. Therefore, some children's needs might be undetected. The new model takes into account not only children who have had an assessment within the school but also those who may be waiting for an assessment. Therefore, it looks at the whole school, the make-up in terms of children and the likely need. It avoids all the time and effort that goes into evaluation and puts the resource into the school. Obviously, the programme must be tested to see whether it will work and any transition will need to take account of the sensibilities expressed by Deputy Thomas Byrne. It is believed that a whole-school approach is better, and that the best approach is for the school to take special education seriously and integrate it right across its programmes. That is the thinking behind this pilot programme.

The review of the pilot has commenced, but I do not have a date for when it will be available. It will not be available for the coming September but should be available after that.

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