Further cuts for special needs pupils

Children with special needs face further cuts to resource teaching as the Government forces schools to cater for more pupils without increased staffing levels.

Education Minister Ruairi Quinn will face a backlash from parents as schools learn today how a combination of rising enrolments and a cap on special needs staff will mean less time for pupils with their resource teachers or children being taught in larger groups in September.

The Irish Examiner understands that just 75% of resource teaching recommended for children with a range of disabilities could be given to their schools by the National Council for Special Education (NCSE), down from 85% in the past school year. This would mean an effective year-on-year cut of 12% for children with autism, visual or hearing impairment, Down’s syndrome, and others, with the prospect of further cuts later in the year if their schools have to support additional pupils.

The NCSE refused to comment on the allocations before the announcement but it is understood there was a surge in applications for resource teachers from schools up to the mid-March deadline. It included a huge increase in applications for second-level students, but a higher-than- usual proportion may have been ineligible for the supports sought.

The cuts began in 2011 when children with a hearing impairment or speech and language disorder, for example, were only given 90% of the four hours of resource teaching a week recommended in the department’s own rules. The 24-minute cut rose to over half an hour a week last year on Mr Quinn’s instructions, and a 75% allocation would see them get an hour less teaching than up to 2011.

The cuts were designed to allow schools cater for pupils newly diagnosed with a disability during the year, but staying within the staffing cap meant no new applications for support have been granted since last October.

The Irish National Teachers’ Organisation said there is no room for further cuts to special needs resources. “The Government has failed to increase resources in line with diagnosed needs or increased enrolments. The result is that schools are already juggling resources and stretching them to the limit to support special needs children,” said INTO general secretary Sheila Nunan.

Primary and second-level schools will get an extra 900 mainstream teachers in September to cater for increasing student numbers while the cap on special needs teachers continues.

Mr Quinn is expected to make a statement on the allocations today. However, when asked by the Irish Examiner on budget day last December why pupils with disabilities face cuts while mainstream teacher numbers continue to rise with enrolments, he said everybody would have to “go that extra mile” in schools to support children with special needs.

The allocation of resource teachers for children with more acute disabilities by the NCSE accounts for over half the 9,950 resource teachers allowed under the department’s special needs cap, which is part of the bailout deal with the troika. The other 4,685 are given to primary schools by the department to cater for children with more common learning difficulties but that number rises every year to match growing enrolments.