The announcement of 660 new special needs teaching posts at primary level may come to represent a watershed in the provision of State facilities for less-able children in our schools.
Critically, the new system empowers schools to respond to the needs of a particular child as they see them. According to Minister for Education, Mary Hanafin, it will ensure that children have access to resource teaching support as soon as they need it, without having to wait for an individual application to be processed.
The announcement, described as "a good day for special needs children and their families" by the Irish National Teachers Organisation (INTO), has the potential to change the face of special needs provision. Instead of enduring a lengthy wait for psychological assessment, parents should be able to access the resources a child requires in his or her own school. It should also obviate the need - for those parents who can afford it - to pay for private assessments to establish the scale of their child's difficulties. The new posts should help also to end a situation where some counties and schools were virtual "blackspots" as regards special needs provision.
The new teaching posts mean that almost 1,200 special education teaching posts have been created in primary schools in the past year. The response of Government in meeting the needs of children with learning difficulties is, at last, beginning to meet the huge demand. The INTO estimates that almost one-in-five children in primary schools has special learning requirements.
Additionally, there are those with more serious needs such as autism and Down's syndrome. These children will continue to be catered for individually and the service to them will be enhanced by the recruitment of more than 70 local special needs organisers throughout the State.
After a faltering start, the Government has done well in recent years in the area of special needs education. Great credit is due to those parents who have highlighted the State's responsibilities in respect of children with special learning needs. Ms Hanafin's announcement is also a success for INTO general secretary John Carr and his executive; they have fought a long and sustained campaign on the issue. For her part, Ms Hanafin deserves credit for securing funds from the Minister for Finance.
Yet, there is still much to be done, especially at second-level, where the degree of special needs provision is nothing like as extensive. Many parents say their children face a very difficult transition from primary schools. This is an important gap and must be bridged too.