Seán Fleming (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

am taking this Topical Issue on behalf of my colleague, Deputy Naughton, Minister of State at the Department of Education. I thank the Deputy for raising this issue, which has been raised at different levels in every constituency. The Deputy has highlighted two schools in his constituency in west Cork and he made the point very clearly. I want to respond as best I can without having the specifics of the particular schools mentioned by him in the few minutes to hand.

There will be more special education teachers in our schools in September 2024 than ever before with an increase of 1,000 from when this Government was formed. This is in addition to a significant reduction in class sizes at primary level over the budgets, where the pupil-teacher ratio at primary level is now 23:1; it used to be substantially higher. This means children with special educational needs in our mainstream schools are better supported now to meet their needs because of this reduction in the pupil-teacher ratio.

In addition, the model will be run annually in line with general teacher allocations. This allows schools to better plan their staffing structures and gives them time to arrange clusters in areas where schools share a special education teacher. That is very relevant in rural areas and constituencies such as the Deputy's where schools can co-operate, work together and have advance information on that issue.

I would like to clarify that the SET model is an allocation model to provide schools with additional teaching hours to support the needs of their students. When the 2017 model was introduced, it replaced at that stage a diagnosis-led model with one based on need. Perhaps the Deputy is suggesting that we need to go back some way to that model. This has not changed for 2024 and it has been the same consistent approach over the past number of years.

There has been a limited change to the method used to calculate SETs for mainstream classes. The Department of Education commenced a review of the model in late 2022 to ensure it was meeting the changing needs in special education. This review involved extensive consultation and visits to schools by the National Council for Special Education, NCSE, and took the strengths and shortcomings of the allocation model into account. This feedback has been incorporated into the revised model for the upcoming school year, 2024-25.

The allocation model for 2024-25 distributes the total available number of special education teaching posts in line with each school’s profile of need. The model makes an allocation based on the number of inputs, including enrolment numbers, as the Deputy said. It also uses school-level data from standardised tests to reflect the level of overall need and complex need within a school. Obviously, if there are positive developments within a school, and if greater literacy and numeracy has been achieved within the school, I can understand the point being made by the Deputy, which is that the school will not score highly within that needs model in subsequent years, having achieved that improved level. What the Deputy is actually saying in layman's English is that some schools are being penalised because of their success or at least that is my interpretation of what he is saying.

This model seeks to distribute the number of teaching resources in the fairest way. Schools have autonomy to decide how best to deploy those resources to meet the needs of their individual students. The Department acknowledges that every school is different and there is always a challenge when making allocations in respect of 4,000 schools at national level. For this reason, the Department, working with the NCSE, has streamlined the review process for special education teaching hours and schools that have any concerns can engage with the council on their allocation.

Reviews are being conducted between March and May to better enable schools to plan for the following September. The new streamlined review process was introduced for the forthcoming year's allocation. A school could request a review of their allocation and many have actually done that. A total of 218 review applications have been received and are being processed at the moment and the NCSE has committed that all schools will receive the outcome of the reviews by the end of this month. In cases where this is happening, schools will be able to plan for that particular matter.

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