Michael Moynihan (Cork North West, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

696. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills the provisions made for providing essential educational resources for children with profound developmental issues to prepare them to enter national school, given that they do not qualify under the July provision programme until after their first year of national school, despite their developmental difficulties having been defined by the Department through the programme to require extra educational assistance outside the school year, and how to access such resources in a timely fashion, when children are still being assessed or, in many cases, waiting months or years for assessments to be provided; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [30369/15]

Jan O'Sullivan (Limerick City, Labour)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

The Deputy may be aware that the State supports early intervention for children with special educational needs through providing funding to a number of crèche/pre-school settings including: early Intervention settings in mainstream and special schools; early Intervention settings in HSE funded service providers; private pre-school settings supported by the Early Childhood Care & Education Scheme (ECCE); private pre-school settings supported by HSE grant aid or HSE funded Pre-School Assistant; Home Tuition Scheme for children aged between 3 and 4 years of age with a diagnosis of autism where a placement in an early intervention setting is not available.

The Deputy may also be aware that the July Provision programme is available to all special schools and mainstream primary schools with special classes catering for children with autism that choose to extend their education services through the month of July. My Department also provides July Provision for pupils with a severe/profound general learning disability. Where school based provision is not feasible, including at post primary level, home based provision may be grant aided.

With regard to the issue of assessments for children I can inform the Deputy that all primary schools have access to psychological assessments either directly through the National Educational Psychological Service (NEPS), or through the Scheme for Commissioning Psychological Assessments (SCPA), full details of which are on the Department's website.

Where a NEPS psychologist is not assigned to a school, authorities therein may access psychological assessments through SCPA. Under this scheme schools can have an assessment carried out by a member of the panel of private psychologists approved by NEPS, and NEPS will pay the psychologist the fees for this assessment directly.

It is the responsibility of the school Principal in the first instance to identify and prioritise pupils for assessment under the process described above.