Robert Troy (Longford-Westmeath, Fianna Fail)
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471. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills further to Parliamentary Question No. 546 of 17 November 2015 concerning a school (details supplied) in County Longford, if she will respond to the clarification sought to aspects of that earlier reply. [43549/15]

Jan O'Sullivan (Limerick City, Labour)
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I wish to advise the Deputy that the National Council for Special Education (NCSE) is responsible, through its network of local Special Educational Needs Organisers (SENOs) for allocating resource teachers and Special Needs Assistants (SNAs) to schools to support children with special educational needs.

The NCSE operates within my Department's criteria in allocating such support. The criteria by which SNA support is allocated to pupils is set out in my Department's Circular 0030/2014.

It is important to note that each school's allocation of SNA support can change from year to year and may be increased or decreased as students who qualify for SNA support enrol or leave a school. New students with care needs may, or may not, enrol to replace students who have left, for example, or SNA allocations may be decreased where a child's care needs have diminished over time.

The NCSE has published details of SNA allocations for schools for September 2015 on its website www.ncse.ie.

The NCSE has advised that the school in question had an allocation of 12 whole time equivalent (WTE) SNA posts for the 2015/16, to support a current enrolment of 26 pupils. In addition the school has 5 teaching staff, which provides 17 whole time staff supporting 26 pupils in the school.

Notwithstanding the fact that these pupils have a range of complex needs, this represents a very significant level of staffing for this school.

The NCSE has advised that the school concerned has recently lodged an appeal of its staffing allocation under the NCSE appeal process, details of which are provided at www.ncse.ie.

The NCSE has advised that this appeal will be processed shortly by a Senior SENO and that the school will be advised of the outcome as soon as possible.