Darren O'Rourke (Meath East, Sinn Fein)
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412. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if she has considered using external training providers to train teachers and school staff in special education schools or settings. [54620/25]

Darren O'Rourke (Meath East, Sinn Fein)
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413. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if she will avail of external training providers to use a more targeted approach to train teachers and staff in special education, rather than a one size fits all approach. [54621/25]

Michael Moynihan (Cork North-West, Fianna Fail)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 412 and 413 together.

This government is fully committed to supporting children with special educational needs to fulfil their full potential and the Programme for Government makes a number of commitments to deliver on this objective.

The Teaching Council registers teachers under the Teaching Council Act 2001-2015 and in line with the Teaching Council Registration Regulations, 2016.

A range of options are available to teachers in regard to training opportunities in special education. These are provided within initial teacher education (ITE) programmes for student teachers and teacher professional learning (TPL) programmes for established teachers. The programmes provided include flexible on-line opportunities right through to funding for post-graduate programmes for special education teachers.

In addition, the National Council for Special Education (NCSE) offer full school support to all staff and provides support for teachers with training needs in special education, through the NCSE support service. This service manages, co-ordinates and develops a range of supports in response to identified teacher training need. The NCSE has also secured the services of Middletown Centre for Autism to deliver support to school staff in special classes for children with autism.

A host of skills and teaching approaches are required every day by teachers in their classrooms. The NCSE support service is vital in this regard to ensuring teachers have the training needed to support all students to ensure no matter where a child is enrolled, they are supported and provided the opportunity to reach their full potential. It is open to any school who feels it has a training need to contact the NCSE and arrange training.