IPPN

Published: 04 February 2005

One of the major talking points among 750 primary school principals attending the Irish Primary Principals' Network (IPPN) annual conference in Citywest, Dublin this week is how to provide for children with special education needs.

Principals are calling for a fair and equitable system of allocating resources for children with special needs to be put in place immediately so that they can plan properly for the needs of these children.

More than 50,000 children (12%) in our primary schools need extra support, resources and teaching to cater for their special needs. The integration and inclusion of children with special needs is part and parcel of every mainstream school - large and small - and is welcomed as a positive development. Legislation such as The Education Act, 1998 and the more recent Education for Persons with Disabilities Act, 2004 now underpins the rights of every child to an adequate and appropriate education. What is not so positive is the lack of co-ordinated support that many principals and teachers face every day in providing for all children in our schools.

Over the past few years, allocation of resources to schools to provide for special needs has been fraught with difficulty and the Department of Education and Science has not been able to deal adequately with the administration and allocation of resources to schools. There have been a number of different systems tried by the DES over the years and, last year, a new "weighted system" was proposed. This system divides special needs pupils into two categories: those with a "high incidence" disability such as specific learning disability, and those with a "low incidence" disability such as autism. Schools were to be given an automatic allowance of extra resource teaching hours for high incidence children based on statistical occurrence and would apply separately for low incidence children. A review of this proposed system was announced by the minister, Mary Hanafin, T.D. when it was realised that the ratios proposed would mean that many smaller schools and schools in disadvantaged areas would actually lose resources under the new plan. According to the DES, this review should be completed in the coming weeks. Minister Hanafin has stated that no pupil with special needs will lose resources. IPPN call for this review to be completed as a matter of urgency.

Principals are concerned that they will face yet another school year uncertain of what resources they will have for the new school year in September. Will they have to let Special Needs Assistants go? Will they lose teaching posts or be in a position to employ a new teacher?

"Although the school year starts in September, principals are planning this from April. They must know by then how many teachers they will have, what rooms they need, what extra resources or classroom assistants might be available in order to plan effectively" points out Seán Cottrell, Director of IPPN.

Very often, school principals cannot get a psychological assessment for a child and cannot, therefore, apply for resources. There are still many schools that do not have an adequate psychological service despite the establishment of NEPS (National Educational Psychological Service) in 1999. Many parents have had to pay privately for a psychological assessment for their child with special needs in order to secure extra help for their child. Many other parents cannot afford this. "Parents are worried that this proposed new system might actually make things worse and make it more difficult for schools to get extra help for their children" says Cottrell.

"Provision for children with special needs must be based on what pupils actually need in the classroom to experience quality learning and not on some arbitrary quota system based on a simplistic calculation assuming that all children are the same. A child with autism, for instance, may be in a multi grade class in a small rural school with a teaching principal or in a large urban school with a special autistic unit in place. Catering for the needs of the child is different in both cases and must be provided for accordingly."

Often, Principals are faced with the dilemma of allocating resources to one child while other children with equally pressing needs receive no extra support. This happens because of the administrative anomalies involved.

Every child sitting in a classroom today deserves the best learning experience that we can provide. In determining what resources and staffing a school needs, we must take into account that children are individuals with individual needs and not simply part of some statistical formula.