Department of Education needs to refine its special education system - Browne

Tipperary Sinn Féin TD and Chair of the Joint Committee on Public Petitions, Martin Browne, said the Department of Education needs to refine its systems to determine the demand for special education places in schools and to allow itself time to provide accordingly.

The Tipperary TD made the comment after raising with the Ombudsman for Children the challenges parents are facing in securing appropriate places in a school local to them.

Teachta Browne said: “Part of the role of the Joint Committee on Public Petitions and the Ombudsman is to consider the various Ombudsmans’ reports which may have not been considered by a Select Committee within two months of the report being laid before either or both Houses of the Oireachtas.

“As such, we were joined recently by the Ombudsman for Children, Niall Muldoon, to discuss ‘Falling
Behind’, which sets out instances in which Ireland falls behind on children’s rights, and related matters.

“An issue of particular relevance was the ongoing challenge being faced by parents across Co Tipperary in securing adequate school places for children with special educational needs.

“I raised this with the Ombudsman, who, in 2022 also published a report “Plan for Places”, which was specifically in response to the difficulties experienced by parents in securing an appropriate school place in their local communities for their child with special educational needs.

“In particular, I asked whether knowledge of a child’s needs that builds up locally through their contacts with the system is used adequately to plan for future school places at senior cycle. Because it doesn’t appear to me that this is being done adequately, as there continues to be a rush for places six months before the start of the new school year.

“In response, the Ombudsman said that locally there is knowledge, but that knowledge doesn’t seem to fit into a national plan to allow every area to get the funding they require from within the department of education.

“He also spoke of how in 2022 a waiting list of over 300 nationally was eventually dealt with in large part due to a concerted effort to do so. However, he noted that while the level of dissatisfaction with the system eased in 2023, cases have begun to build up again.

“It is my belief that forward planning is part of the issue here that there is a disconnect between the information being available and that information being converted into places.

“However, as was seen, this can be improved when the department increases its response. I have called upon the Department to precisely do this and to keep refining its systems to determine, in good time, the demand for special education places in schools and to allow itself time to provide accordingly.

“The proper, active and ongoing refinement of the data that is available to the Department needs more work in order to prevent the frantic search for places that parents are faced with each year due to the last-minute arrangements that has now become typical of the Department.”