Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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582. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills to set out the total number of special needs teachers currently available throughout County Kildare in primary level and secondary level sectors; the extent to which this may be augmented on foot of already documented requirements, as set out by the various local school authorities; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [26405/15]

Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)
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583. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills to set out the total number of special needs assistants currently available at primary level and secondary level throughout County Kildare; the extent to which it is expected to augment these numbers in line with submitted requests from school authorities in the course of the next 12 months; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [26406/15]

Jan O'Sullivan (Limerick City, Labour)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 582 and 583 together.

There are now more additional teachers and special needs assistants (SNAs) supporting children with special educational needs in our schools than at any time previously. The NCSE allocated 6,454 resource teacher posts to schools for September 2015, which is an increase of 554 posts - or 9.4% - since September 2014. Details of resource teaching allocations to schools is available on the NCSE website on a county by county basis at www.ncse.ie.

An additional 149 special classes will open in September which brings to over 1,000, the number of special classes in mainstream schools and represents a 17% increase over the 2014/15 number of special classes. Details of special class teachers and special school allocations for 2015/16 is available on the NCSE website at www.ncse.ie. In addition, 11,330 SNA posts, an increase of 365 posts, or over 3%, are available to the NCSE to allocate to the end of 2015. This is the highest level of special needs teachers and SNA support that we have ever had, and will ensure that children with special educational needs can continue to participate in education and be supported in a manner appropriate to their needs.

Details of the number of SNA and Resource Teachers which have been allocated to each school are published on a per county basis on the NCSE website www.ncse.ie, which provides details of all of the SNA and Resource Teacher allocations which have been made to each school in County Kildare by the NCSE. Details of the 2014/15 and 2015/16 school year Resource Teaching allocations have been published.

This year, the NCSE requested all schools to submit applications for SNA support by mid March 2015. Following this deadline each application had to be assessed by the NCSE before they were in a position to advise the Minister on the quantum of SNAs that would need to be allocated to schools for the coming school year. The final advice on this was received last week, and the Minister will be seeking to confirm allocations to schools over the next ten days. Details of SNA allocations to schools for 2015/16 will be available on the NCSE website on completion of this process.