Pauline Tully (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

834. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills to detail the access routes and inclusive education initiatives that have been introduced since 2020 for learners with disabilities; the number of disabled people accessing further and higher education courses in 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023 and 2024; and the funding allocated in the Budget to support disabled people in further or higher education in 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023 and 2024, in tabular form. [36195/24]

Patrick O'Donovan (Limerick County, Fine Gael)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

Higher Education:

The HEA collects data on students with disabilities from two data sources: the number of students supported by the Fund for Students with Disabilities and the number of students reported as having a disability from the Equal Access Survey, a voluntary set of questions asked of first years in higher education each year.

The table below represents the number of new entrants indicating a disability in the Equal Access Survey on entry to higher education (number and % of new entrants).

The Fund for Students with Disabilities (FSD) funds HEIs to provide services and support to eligible students with disabilities. FSD is one of the main funding sources supporting participation by students with disabilities in approved further and higher education courses in Ireland.

The table below details the number of students supported by FSD in Higher Education and total funding allocated under FSD in 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, and 2024:

In 2022 a Programme for Access to Higher Education (PATH) to include Universal design for learning (UDL) and course provision for students with intellectual disabilities was introduced.

This had an initial commitment of €12 million and was broken down into two streams PATH 4 Phase 1 UDL and PATH 4 Phase 2 Courses for Students with Intellectual Disabilities.

PATH 4 Phase 1.

In 2022 €3million was issued to the Higher Education Institutes (HEIs) for the roll out of UDL which creates and inclusive environment for all.

In February 2024, a further €1.8million was announced to deliver inclusion measures, including to roll out sensory maps of college campuses to support autistic learners and for anti-racism measures particularly to challenge racism for members of the Traveller and Roma communities. This strand of the National Access Plan is a dedicated fund provided by the HEA to individual HEI's as autonomous Institutes and data is not collected on an individual basis.

PATH 4 Phase 2 is a programme for higher education courses for students with an intellectual disability. With a total investment of over €11 million, the courses are to be delivered in 11 higher education colleges across the country and will provide significant opportunities for students with intellectual disabilities. Approximately 160 students can be expected to enrol in the academic year 2024/25, but in relation to data on student numbers, these will not be collected until later in the year.

The table below details the total funding allocated under PATH 4- Phase 1 & 2 to date, along with approximate number of students supported for Phase 2 ONLY:

Further Education

Education and Training Boards (ETBs) provide a wide range of supports to learners with a disability, including guidance, an education disadvantage fund, a specific Fund for Learners with Disabilities (FLD) participating in Post Leaving Certificate provision in FET (which includes support from personal assistants), psychological support, Universal Design for Learning Principles, and a general allocation ‘Learner Support’ fund for all learners across FET provision. Likewise, FET courses are typically free of charge or heavily subsidised.

Widening participation is also a national target under the Strategic Performance Agreements (SPA) for 2022-24 agreed between SOLAS and the 16 ETBs. The funding, support access routes and inclusive education initiatives have resulted in these targets being surpassed.

The following table includes a breakdown of the overall ‘Widening Participation’ SPA targets and actual numbers of learners for the years 2022 – 2024.

SOLAS provides funding to several agencies for specific initiatives to support the participation of people with disabilities in FET. A breakdown of these is:

The primary support for people with special education needs in the FET sector is the Fund for Learners with Disabilities (FLD). The purpose of the FLD is to provide funding to PLC colleges to assist them in offering supports and services to eligible learners with disabilities so that they can participate on an equal basis with their peers.

A breakdown of funding and learners supported through this fund since 2020 is:

*Note: number of learners supported is not a unique count as a student may have more than one disability / support .

In Budget 2024, an additional €2 million was allocated to the FSD to support the progressive roll-out of the Fund across all FET programmes beyond PLC colleges and the pay increase granted to Personal Assistants.

SOLAS’ publication This is FET Learners with Disabilities 2022 found 6.8% of all learners enrolled in FET programmes, that is nearly 13,000 learners, reported having at least one type of disability. 91.6% of learners reporting a disability partially or fully completed a course in 2022.

A breakdown of declared disabilities in FET over the period 2020-2023 is as follows:

I trust this clarifies the matter for the Deputy.