Olwyn Enright (Laois-Offaly, Fine Gael)
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Question 394: To ask the Minister for Education and Science the procedure for NEPS psychologists with regard to prioritising assessments; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [34818/05]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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The Deputy will be aware of the new model recently introduced by my Department for the general allocation to primary schools of resources for children with special educational needs. This ensures that children within the high incidence categories of special needs will have their automatic entitlements to additional teaching resources dealt with in an efficient and effective manner, without the requirement of a psychological assessment. However, I accept that parents and teachers will require psychological assessments in order to provide more information and advice in particular cases.

In common with many other educational psychological services, the national educational psychological service, NEPS, operates a staged model of service to schools, whereby an initial referral usually leads to a consultation and provision of advice to teachers and parents on appropriate teaching and management strategies. Progress is kept under review and only those children who fail to respond to these interventions will need to see a psychologist. This allows the psychologists to offer early appointments to children who are in urgent need of support and early advice to teachers in respect to those children whose needs are perhaps less pressing but who still need additional help in school.

Principal teachers refer children to NEPS psychologists assigned to the schools and the urgency in each case is discussed on the visit of the psychologist to the particular school. Where serious disabilities are suspected in a school going child, NEPS, in consultation with principal teachers, prioritises an assessment to ensure that there is not a long waiting time. If the child attends a school that is not yet served by NEPS, an assessment may be arranged under the scheme for commissioning psychological assessments, SCPA. Principals of schools that avail of this scheme prioritise the more serious cases for early assessment.