John Lahart (Dublin South West, Fianna Fail)
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154. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills the percentage of children with complex special educational needs such as autism spectrum disorder; if it is safe to include them in a mainstream class in primary school; if there is a requirement of balance between children with and without special educational needs in classrooms; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [14334/18]

Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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The policy of this Department is to ensure that all children with special educational needs can be provided with an education appropriate to their needs.

This Department provides for a range of placement options and supports for schools, which have enrolled students with special educational needs, in order to ensure that wherever a child is enrolled, s/he will have access to an appropriate education.

Where possible, provision is made for the inclusive education of children with special educational needs. Department policy is that children with special educational needs should be included where possible and appropriate in mainstream placements with additional supports provided. In circumstances where children with special educational needs require more specialised interventions, special school or special class places are provided for.

The National Council for Special Education (NCSE) is an independent statutory body whose functions include planning and co-ordinating the provision of education and support services to children with special educational needs in conjunction with schools and the Health Service Executive (HSE). The NCSE, through its network of local Special Educational Needs Organisers (SENOs), is responsible for processing applications from schools for special educational needs supports as required, once a child has been enrolled in a school.

The NCSE is also responsible for the establishment of special classes in mainstream primary and post primary schools. Special classes offer a supportive learning environment to students who are unable to access the curriculum in a mainstream class, even with support, for most or all of their school day. Special classes are for students who have a recommendation for a special class placement in their professional reports.

Autism is a spectrum disorder the characteristics of which can present themselves in a wide variety of combinations and can range from mild to severe. The NCSE’s Autism Policy Advice, published in 2015, did not recommend any restriction or limits on the numbers of children with Autism which could be present in one mainstream class, nor did they identify any criteria which might indicate a need for such limitations.  

Circulars 0013/2017 for primary schools and 0014/2017 for post primary schools, published on 7th March 2017, 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 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.

The provision of a profiled allocation is designed to give a fairer allocation for each school which recognises that all schools need an allocation for special needs support, but which provides a graduated allocation which takes into account the actual level of needs identified in schools through the identification process.

This means that, where there are a higher number of children with special educational needs in a school, the school will receive a higher level of supports to support those children.