Mick Clifford: Why isn’t the minister making schools open new special classes?
Aidan O'Mahony and Aileen O'Reilly, Togher, Cork.
Aidan O’Mahony laid out a spreadsheet of secondary schools in which he is trying to get his son enrolled.
He lives in Ballyphehane on Cork’s southside, but he has attempted to get a place as far away as Glanmire, on the road to Dublin.
No luck.
His son Alex is now in sixth class and practically all secondary school places have been allocated. Alex has autism and has, throughout his primary school education, been in a special class.
“Some schools said they weren’t accepting applications as they are already full,” Aidan says.
“They might have places for siblings or children whose father was in the school. Me and my wife are from Mallow so we don’t fall into that category.
"The ones that are accepting applications, we’ve just got rejection after rejection.”
Alex is independent and has made huge strides through his class at Morning Star School in Ballyphehane.
“There are four secondary schools in walking distance but he can’t get a place in them at all. He’s very independent, walks home from school, and it’s been good for him.”
The family has been through the usual fight that is required to get services which their offspring should be provided with by right.
“We’ve been in contact with everyone , the SENO (Special Education Needs Officer), all the TDs, anyone who can help us. All we want is the same as any parent.
"As it is we now have three options left to us. We can hold him back an extra year in primary which would devastate him, or put him in mainstream but we worry about his development and any disruption he might cause in class.
It wasn’t supposed to be like this. In recent years, change has come to the growing problem of providing education for all.
The Minister of State for Education with responsibility in this area, Josepha Madigan, made it her mission to properly cater for those requiring special education.
The political will was driven, to a large extent, by a series of media reports highlighting the devastation that can be caused to families who can’t get a school place for their child.
This had been tolerated by the education system in general for too long. Some progress was finally made.
“Over the last number of years, the Department and the NCSE [National Council For Special Education] have introduced a number of strategic initiatives to plan for and provide sufficient special class and special school places,” according to a spokesperson for the Department of Education.
“These initiatives are bearing fruit with almost 1,300 new special classes sanctioned and seven new special schools established over the last four years.”
Better late than never, but that progress does not go far enough. Parents of some children are still struggling to find places and equally, some schools are avoiding their obligations.
For many, this is a truth that dare not speak its name, but one school, Cork Educate Together Secondary School (CETSS) does not shy away from calling out what’s going on.
CETSS, one of the more recently opened schools in Cork, has three special classes. The admissions policy for CETSS references the big picture in this respect.
“CETSS believes that it is the moral responsibility of all schools to open autism/special classes in proportion to their size and depending on the need in their locality,” the policy states.
“This is not currently the case, and so we urge the minister to use their new powers (Section 37a of the Admissions Act) to open additional classes across Cork city.”
The powers referred to is the legislative heft that Madigan added as part of her apparent drive to provide education for all. There already existed provision to force schools to open special classes in response to demand.
However, the provisions contained a whole range of loopholes for schools to slip free from the obligation should they be so inclined.
The new provision, which is in its first academic year in force, means that if a SENO determines that a need is not being met, a report is compiled for the minister who then has the power to instruct the school in question to open a class. No ifs or buts. No excuses that, well, really, we’re not that kind of school.
According to the department, the minister has not had to exercise her new power since last September. On one level, that might suggest that there is no problem with placements, which is patently not the case.
In all likelihood, there have been occasions over the last three months when a SENO might have determined that the need for a special class was not being met and thereafter engaged with the school principal to come to some arrangement.
Negotiation is always better than unilateral imposition. However, it remains the case that an indeterminable number of children are still not receiving the welcome to which they should be entitled.
“You should be allowed go to school with siblings and neighbours,” Colm O’Connor, principal of CETSS, says. “The reason you can’t is because schools are not forced to open classes.
"They may claim they don’t have space, and that may be true, but how would you test it? Send down an inspector who is used to making timetables and could see what is going on.
"It also raises the question should you be allowed to take in as many students as you want yet say you don’t have space for a special class. You could take in one class fewer and open up a couple of rooms. The onus should be on every school where there is a need to open a special class.”
There is no longer any excuse for delaying on this. The minister can instruct the school to comply. Those schools that are only lukewarm about their obligation can no longer slip through a loophole.
If the law is now claiming that education is genuinely open to all then it’s time to ensure that the law is observed by everybody in the interests of all the State’s children.
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