New education therapy service could be ‘transformational' for special needs pupils, says McEntee
A new education therapy service staffed with 90
therapists
will start in 45 special schools from September.
The new posts will be initially for occupational therapists and speech and language therapists. The service will provide individualised therapeutic interventions for children who need them.
The service will be provided in special schools first, but will then be rolled out to mainstream schools, according to
Minister for Education Helen McEntee
.
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The proposal is included in the Government's
Actions in Education Plan 2025
, which will be announced on Thursday.
The National Education Therapy Service will start recruiting to begin the full service from the start of the 2026-27 school year.
Ms McEntee said the new service could be 'transformational for children attending our special schools, ensuring they have early and timely access to the services that they need.
'For children attending special classes in mainstream schools, the earlier sanctioning of these classes is central to providing clarity for them and their families.'
She also wants a national survey of all parents of school-going and preschool children to determine what type of education they want to see for their children. This will look at the issue of patronage and what kind of schools parents want for their children.
Ms McEntee said she will also be publishing a new Deis (Delivering Equality of Opportunity in Schools) plan to tackle educational disadvantage and take steps to address absenteeism.
'I will work with schools to reduce the costs they are facing and also work to reduce costs faced by parents, such as the cost of uniforms,' she said.
'Consultation with parents will be a key feature as I commence work to develop a new circular to tackle back-to-school costs.'
The plan also includes 400 new special classes in mainstream schools and the roll-out of free schoolbooks to all schools.
The shortage of teachers in schools is to be tackled by earlier access to permanent contracts, while allowing newly qualified teachers trained outside the State to apply for registration and complete their induction in the Republic.
There are also plans for a new common applications system for school admissions to be in place in several pilot schools in 2026, which will end the need for parents to make multiple applications to schools.
Absenteeism is to be tackled by monitoring children under the age of six who regularly miss school. The State does not monitor school attendance in those under the age of six.
The Government will provide €9 million in funding to schools to support new measures to tackle mobile phone use. This is the same amount of money allocated for the controversial pouches, which were supposed to be provided for schools nationwide to keep phones during school hours.
A new plan for Deis will be developed for those schools which have the highest level of disadvantage.
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