Fergus O'Dowd (Louth, Fine Gael)
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476. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if any explanation can be given to students suffering from a diagnosis of dyscalculia where they are having to source and pay a psychologist to complete an assessment report in order to apply for the DARE scheme, when required assessments for dyslexia and other assessment are undertaken by the school; if he will provide details; if there are any plans to address the matter; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [62011/22]

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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The Disability Access Route to Education (DARE) is operated by the Irish Universities Association (IUA) on behalf of the higher education institutions who set the policy criteria for the scheme.

However we requested a response to your email from the IUA who have confirmed the following:-

DARE is a competitive process. All first year undergraduate programmes in DARE participating colleges have more DARE eligible applicants than there are places available. In order to protect the integrity of DARE, applicants must present evidence of disability in order to substantiate their claim that their disability has significantly impacted their education. This includes both dyslexia and dyscalculia. These criteria are set by an expert panel (incl. several senior psychologists and educational psychologists) according to international best practice.

The nature of both dyslexia and dyscalculia is that they are dynamic i.e. their impact can change over time according to interventions and support. In the case of both of these conditions DARE require full reports in order to evidence that the applicant has been diagnosed with the condition and secondly updated scores from their school to evidence the ongoing prevalence of the condition. DARE received over 2000 applications under dyslexia and dyscalculia in 2022, a significant proportion of those were provided by private psychologists. Whilst many were received through NEPS, DARE has no jurisdiction to influence how and for whom the state provide free educational assessments.