Emer Currie (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister of State and congratulate her on the budget and her securing of investment in special education in addition to that of last year. I thank her for her support to date in Dublin West. She came out to visit Rath Dara Community College, as it is now known, in Dublin 15. She understands the building issue concerning Danu Community Special School. I thank the Government for the opening of Danu Community Special School in November 2019 with the patron, Dublin and Dún Laoghaire Education and Training Board, DDLETB, at the temporary site at Hansfield. I am sure we will talk about the building at some stage but today is more about the resources.

I would prefer it if we were talking about the future of the children, but today I am talking about the future of the school because the school feels it is going from incident to incident and crisis to crisis in managing and not focusing enough on education and learning. When I say "the school", I am talking about the parents and the brilliant work of the Autism School Dublin 15 committee. The committee was behind the opening of the school and campaigned for it.

The children associated with the school have very complex and challenging behavioural needs. They are non-verbal and communicate through their behaviour. They have severe learning disabilities. Some have sensory impairments, and they can have autism spectrum disorder and anxiety. We are dealing with complex cases involving children who were not in school. They are the most vulnerable of all children, and their families are the ones under the most pressure. They need the right resources in their school. They need the wrap-around supports, behavioural therapists, the psychologist, occupational therapists, speech and language therapists and physiotherapists. The reality is that they do not feel they are getting them. I am not sure the Minister of State is aware of how serious the circumstances are.

The school has 30 children. This number will rise to 34 in January and to 36, the allocation, in September 2022. The school has a principal, six teachers and 15 special needs assistants, but it feels it needs more based on the assessments of the children.At the moment they are getting two hours of behavioural support a week with a behavioural therapist. This is three hours remotely. This is their second therapist, which is important to mention in the context of knowledge and consistency. They feel that they cannot focus on education at the moment because they are purely focused on managing behaviours. They need the expertise of a behavioural therapist. They are looking for a full-time behavioural therapist to work with proactive strategies and not to be constantly be dealing with the behavioural challenges.

The school has asked what is the policy and what is the definition of the new special school model. They want clarity on what differentiates them from a special class in a school and about getting those wraparound supports. The needs must be based on the needs of the children not the size of the school. They are constantly battling that with the 1993 Special Education Review Committee, SERC, allocation of one teacher and two SNAs for six students. To the school that is just not enough when dealing with the complexity of the cases. Where does Progressing Disability Services fit around this? We are not just talking about education here, we are also talking about life skills for the future.

The school feels that it is surviving and coping but not thriving or managing. The school is in a building that is not fit for purpose. It has dealt with the pandemic. There is a constant staff turnover. I know the staff personally, and the incentives are not there. Why would the SNAs and the teachers take on these complex cases when they do not feel that they are getting the right supports in this instance? They are overwhelmed. Hopefully we can talk about the building itself in the next section. This is a cry for help.