John Connolly (Galway West, Fianna Fail)

I will start by mentioning the July provision in schools around the country. One of the many successful measures taken by the Minister of State's predecessor was the expansion of the in-school July provision to mainstream schools, which occurred following the Covid years. I am not sure if the Minister of State has the figures but I estimate that tens of thousands of children are currently participating in July provision across the country. Schools have the discretion to extend participation, not only to pupils with additional needs, but to all children whom the school considers to be at risk of educational disadvantage. I commend the mainstream schools that have embraced the measure. This year, the scheme has become more amenable to schools. There is a great emphasis in the programme on well-being, wellness and connection. I hope that all the children who are participating in the summer programme are enjoying it. It was a great measure to take. It highlighted the fact that we have come a long way in terms of the provision for children with additional educational needs. I hope to see this programme grow and that more schools will become involved in the scheme in the coming years.

I welcome the publication of the review of the EPSEN Act. I commend, in particular, how thorough the data-collection process was as part of the review. I will start my own reflections on report by highlighting something that I do not think has been highlighted yet by any other speaker. This is the positive feedback provided by parents on how they rate the quality of the education their child receives in their current school. As I said, the feedback is overwhelmingly positive. A total of 86.3% of parents with children in mainstream primary schools view the education their children are in receipt of as being "fairly good" or "very good". Some 87.6% of parents,m who have children in a class for children with additional needs in a mainstream setting, gave a very positive response and see their child's education as being "fairly good" or "very good". In the special schools, 86% of parents said they found that the education their child was receiving was "fairly good" or "very good". This is a very positive thing. It does not surprise me. As a teacher and as a parent, I would have assumed those statistics would be as they are but it is nice to see them written down and to see that they were collated in the manner that they were in this review.

One aspect of school life of the child where the reflections are not as positive is in the area of transition, be that children transitioning from one primary school to perhaps a school for children with additional needs or children transitioning between primary school and secondary school. In the implementation plan brought forward as a result of this report, we should examine this. We need to try to define how we do this well. I am sure there are good examples of this throughout the country, where the transition is done well between schools. We must examine that and try to make sure we implement it across the board.

I welcome the plan and the move to place the development of what was known as the individual education plan, and is now known as the student support plan, on a statutory basis. I expect that there are special educational needs organisers, SENOs, and inspectors who would have seen very good practice in the completion of the student support plans. They have become a very important document in schools. Again it is worth noting the feedback, with 75% of parents saying that they had been "fairly involved" or "very involved" in developing or reviewing their child's support plan. This is very positive. It highlights the importance the schools place now on the positive relationship between schools, teachers and parents in progressing a child's education. I will give some more of the data. More than 70% of parents said that they found the student support plan to be "helpful" or "very helpful" and staff really see it as being helpful. The figure for staff who saw the student support plan as being "helpful" or "very helpful" was close to 90%, I think. One of the things I noticed from the student support plans I read and participated in developing over the years was how they also tried to link with the other agencies that might be working with the child. It took the recommendations from other therapists and psychologists and tried to make sure the targets in the plan were included and implemented, and all the while, working with teachers and parents.

I welcome the feedback on terminology in the report. We should be conscious of its findings. Consideration should be given across the board to replace the term "special" with "additional". We should probably start with the Minister of State's portfolio. Maybe it is necessary to change the title of that to the Minister of State with responsibility for "additional educational needs" rather than "special educational needs". We can make all the legislative and policy changes that are planned but, ultimately, resource change is what will have the biggest impact. We need more SNAs and supplementary teachers.

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