Mother welcomes reversal of decision to cancel autism class

Special class at Douglas Rochestown Educate Together school to be opened as planned

Cillín O'Sullivan can now look forward to starting in the class at Douglas Rochestown Educate Together National School.

A mother who this week highlighted moves to cancel her son’s autism class in Cork is now “reasonably confident” that the class will open as planned.

Elbha O’Sullivan spoke to the Irish Examiner after she learned that special classes for autism at Douglas Rochestown Educate Together National School were not opening as planned in February.

Her youngest son Cillín is due to start in the class when his school moves to its new permanent building in 2023. The classes had been sanctioned, with families applying for places last September, to be told last week that the support for their opening had since been withdrawn. 

The National Council for Special Education (NCSE) has since provided assurances that the class will open, according to Ms O’Sullivan.

“It is great news. I am delighted they reversed the decision," she said. However, she added that she is still upset that the initial decision to cancel the class was taken “so lightly”. 

“It obviously wasn’t a big deal to reverse it. There wasn’t an insurmountable problem, they just decided it was inconvenient. I don’t know really what the reason was. Then, when we went public about it, they reversed it in a week. That points to a systemic failure.”

Parents should keep in mind that their children have a constitutional right to an appropriate education, she added.

“You need to escalate it through the NCSE, and not be afraid to do that. I had to approach media and TDs and it seems like that works, but I don’t think that any family should be in that position.

"The patron of your school has a responsibility to support you, and the board of management. Educate Together did support us, and it was from agitation from multiple areas that we were able to get movement.” 

However, families should not be in this position, she added. 

"It should be more straightforward than this.

"It’s not just us, I put this out on social media, and other parents from other schools, from Mayo, Dublin, and Bandon, contacted me to say they are in the same position. The NCSE, on the one hand, cannot be updating legislation to almost compel schools to open classes, and then have schools who want to open classes being told no.

I wonder do the people making these decisions ever think of the real impact on people, the amount of worries we had and the amount of public advocacy we had to do?”

A spokesman for the Department of Education said it and the NCSE have introduced a number of recent strategic initiatives to plan for and provide sufficient special classes and special school places. 

“These initiatives are bearing fruit with over 600 new special classes sanctioned at primary level, almost 300 new special classes sanctioned at post-primary level, and five new special schools established over the last three years.” 

The department is engaging intensely with the NCSE about planning for new special classes for the next school year, he added.