Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Solidarity)
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266. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if he will review the model being used for the allocation of learning support and resource teaching hours to take account of the needs of a school (details supplied) over multiple years; if he will review the decision to cut the hours allocated to the school; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [16350/17]

Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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I wish to advise the Deputy that DES Circular 0013/2017 for primary schools and Circular 0014/2017 for post primary schools were published on 7th March 2017.

These Circulars set out the details of the new model for allocating special education teachers to schools.

The revised allocation process replaces the generalised allocation process at primary and post primary school level for learning support and high incidence special educational needs, and the National Council for Special Education (NCSE) allocation process which provided additional resource teaching supports to schools, to support pupils assessed as having Low Incidence disabilities.

The new Special Education Teaching allocation provides a single unified allocation for special educational support teaching needs to each school, based on each school’s educational profile.

Allocations based on the school profiles were issued to all schools on 7th March.  Details of the special education teaching allocations have also been published on the NCSE website.

The aim of this new model is to deliver better outcomes for children with special educational needs. Substantial research, analysis, consultation with service users and stakeholders, and piloting have gone in to the development of this model and all of the evidence points to the fact that this new system will deliver better outcomes for children.

No school, including the school to which the Deputy has referred, will lose supports as a result of the implementation of the new model. In addition, no school will receive an allocation, for the support of pupils with complex needs, less than the allocation they received to support such pupils during the 2016/17 school year.

For the introduction of the new allocation model, from September 2017, the NCSE ‘Low Incidence’ allocations which had been made for each school during the preceding 2016/17 school year, have been used to establish the complex needs component of the new model for each school. The use of this data has ensured that the most up to date data on the distribution of pupils in this category across the school system has been used. Standardised test data over a number of years, as set out in DES Circular 0013/2017, have been used for all primary schools.

An additional 900 teaching posts have been provided to support the introduction of this new allocation model. The provision of an additional 900 teaching posts is a very significant investment in the provision of additional teaching support for pupils with special educational needs in our schools. This is additional to an increase of 41% in the number of resource teachers allocated to schools annually by the NCSE since 2011.

The additional funding will provide additional supports to over 1200 schools who are identified as needing additional supports as a result of the new model. Supports for children with special educational needs is a key priority for this Government. The new funding will ensure that all schools receive a sufficient allocation of special education needs resources to provide additional teaching support to all pupils, including pupils who have yet to enrol in their school, who require such support. 

In relation to the particular school referred to by the Deputy in his question, this school had a General Allocation Model allocation of 50 hours for the 2016/17 school year, which combined with 30.18 resource teaching hours allocated to the school by the National Council for Special Education, gave a total allocation to the school of 80.18 additional teaching hours for the 2016/17 school year.

As the profiled allocation for the school did not indicate an increased allocation requirement for the school for 2017/18, the school has maintained its existing level of allocation.

The special education teaching allocation for this school for 2017/18 is 80.18 hours.

There has therefore been no reduction to the special education teaching allocation for this school.

Schools must notify the Department on Form S.E.T. Cluster 2017, Appendix D of the primary Staffing Schedule, of their clustering arrangements for their new Special Education allocation.

Completed forms should be returned to the Department’s Primary Teacher Allocations Section as soon as possible but no later than close of business on 30th March 2017.

S.E.T. hours that are clustered into new full-time permanent posts and received before this deadline will be automatically approved by the Department. Schools that do not return the completed form within the above timeframe or where all of a school’s S.E.T hours are not clustered into full-time posts will be included, as appropriate, in the Department led clustering process.

Guidelines for schools on the organisation, deployment and use of their special education teachers to address the need of pupils with special educational needs are also being prepared and will be published shortly.

The Guidelines will support schools to reflect on how they can review and manage their timetabling practices to ensure the timetable is sufficiently flexible to meet the needs of all pupils in their school who have special needs. The Guidelines encourage schools to ensure they deploy their resources appropriately to meet the needs of all of the children in their school who require additional teaching support, including pupils with emerging needs, or new entrants.

The NCSE has announced the commencement of an independent appeals process through which schools may appeal the allocation made to their school if they believe the data upon which the allocation is based is incorrect or has been incorrectly used.