Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire (Cork South Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The cohort comprising children with special educational needs is the cohort most affected when school buildings are closed, along with those who suffer educational disadvantage. These children were among the greatest victims of the lockdown. At a meeting of the Joint Committee on Education, Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science in March, I raised with the Minister the devastating impact removing in-school supports from children with special educational needs as an element of the progressing disability model could have. I welcomed the pause put on those elements of the progressing disability model in special schools in April but I am now hearing reports from schools in my area that those elements of the progressing disability programme have resumed and that access to those in-school supports has been lost. How has this been allowed to go ahead?

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