Written answers

Tuesday, 28 November 2017

Department of Education and Skills

Special Educational Needs Service Provision

Photo of Seán CroweSeán Crowe (Dublin South West, Sinn Fein)
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207. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills the reason a decision was made to remove the special needs assistant support for a person (details supplied); if this decision will be reviewed; and if this decision will be reversed. [50569/17]

Photo of Richard BrutonRichard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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The National Council for Special Education (NCSE), which is an independent statutory agency, is responsible, through its network of local Special Educational Needs Organisers (SENOs) for allocating a quantum of Special Needs Assistant (SNA) support for each school annually taking into account the assessed care needs of children qualifying for SNA support enrolled in the school.  The NCSE operates within my Department's criteria in allocating such support, as set out in Circular 0030/2014.

In considering applications for SNA supports for individual students, the SENOs take account of the student's needs and considers the resources available to the school to identify whether additionality is needed or whether the school might reasonably be expected to meet the needs of the students from its current level of resources. SNAs are not allocated to individual students but to schools as a school based resource.

Details of SNA allocations which have been made to schools for the 2017/18 school year have been published by the NCSE on their website at .

Where a school has received its allocation of SNA support for 2017/18, but wishes new enrolments or new assessments to be considered, which were not taken into account when the initial allocation was made, they may continue to make applications to the NCSE.

The NCSE Appeals Process may be invoked in the following instances:

- a parent or a school where it is considered that a child was not granted access to SNA support on the grounds that Department policy was not met in accordance with Circular 0030/2014.

- a school may also appeal a decision, where the school considers that the NCSE, in applying Department policy, has not allocated the appropriate level of SNA supports to the school to meet the special educational and/or care needs of the child(ren) concerned.

All schools have the contact details of their local SENO and parents may also contact their local SENO directly to discuss their child's special educational needs, using the contact details available at .

The NCSE has advised that the school should submit a new application for SNA support for the student referred to by the Deputy, as additional information in support of the application, which was not available at the time of the annual allocation process, has now become available. My officials have asked the NCSE to liaise with the School to ensure that the additional information is considered.

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