Moving to Ireland with special needs children: education resources
I had a very interesting question from a reader this week who is in the midst of planning a move to Ireland.
I am not sharing any personal information (not that I have much), but if anyone wants to chime in on this topic, please feel free to do so.
The question was as follows:
Liam: Thank you for providing detailed and accurate information about moving to Ireland. My oldest is severely autistic so we are researching schools and support in and around Galway, any help or direction?
I have received similar questions on more than one occasion, so I think it's best that I create a place on the site where it can be discussed, and information can be shared by me and by others.
Education resources in Ireland for children with special needs
My first recommendation for anybody researching education facilities for their child with special needs is to visit the website of The National Council for Special Education (NCSE)
From their website: The NCSE "was set up to improve the delivery of education services to persons with special educational needs arising from disabilities with particular emphasis on children."
The website has a lot of very relevant information, including an informative FAQ section, a listing of all schools in Ireland who specialize in educating children with special needs, and a downloadable guide to choosing a school for your special need child. I think the school list will be of benefit to a lot of parents who are moving to Ireland, or even moving within Ireland. If you download the file, you will be able to search/browse for schools that cater to your child's need, in the locality/county you hope to move to.
Additional Resources
In addition to the NCSE, your research for how good a fit a school/locality will be for your child should include some time spent reading the information provided by the following establishments.
Education.ie
Supports for Children with Special Educational Needs
National Behaviour Support Service
http://www.nbss.ie/
Irish Learning Support Association
http://www.ilsa.ie/
National Disability Authority
http://nda.ie/
Association for Higher Education Access & Disability
http://www.ahead.ie/
The Irish Learning Support Association
http://www.ilsa.ie/
I know that the information provided here is not very detailed, and will only serve to get you started on your hunt for a good school for your child. This is certainly a topic that could do with more detail being added from someone who has personal experience in this area of education. If that's you, either as a parent, teacher, assistant, etc, please do get in touch (either with a comment below, or an email to me), and offer whatever information you can share, so that other's can benefit from it.
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This is a couple of sections from Christina’s coursework for her FETAC in Child Care including special needs.
Legislation.
The “Disability Act 2005” along with the “Equal Status Act 2000”, the “Equality Act 2004” plus of course the “Education for persons with special educational needs Act 2004” lay down the legislation or at least some of the legislation concerning pupils with Special needs. Other items stem from the “Education Act 1998” and the “Equal status acts” between 2000 and 2011.
Equal status acts in respect of education including Pre School and Private Schools, gives set rules on what constitutes discrimination. It also gives provision for certain activities that do not constitute discrimination within educational facilities. Some of these rules have the proviso of “reasonable or nominal cost”
The disability act 2005 also lays down items which must be set in place by all public bodies including all educational establishments. Public buildings including schools must be made accessible to people with disabilities. Public services and information must be accessible to people with disabilities. There must also be an active move towards making employment opportunities available to people with disabilities. It defines disability in a restrictive fashion as;- ’’disability’, in relation to a person, means a substantial restriction in the capacity of the person to carry on a profession, business or occupation in the State or to participate in social or cultural life in the State by reason of an enduring physical, sensory, mental health or intellectual impairment’
In order to be assessed under the 2005 Act, an individual must be determined to be of reduced capability which is “permanent or likely to be permanent, results in a significant difficulty in communication, learning or mobility or in significantly disordered cognitive processes, and means that he or she has a need for services to be provided continually or that they have the need for services to be provided in early life to ameliorate the disability”.
Only children born after 1st June 2002 are currently able to apply for assessment.
Assessment.
In order to initiate the assessment process parents or guardians must make applications through their “Local Health Office” using the official application form. The HSE must acknowledge receipt of the application within 14 days. Whilst there is no specified time scale given for processing the application the regulations specify a three month maximum laps before commencement and a three month period from commencement to completion. Hence unless there are “exceptional circumstances” the process from application to production of an initial assessment report should be approved or denied within around a six month period.
In order to carry out assessments the HSE has appointed Assessment Officers who work independent of the HSE itself. The Assessment officers will help with the filling out of the application forms and provide information which might assist with the assessment. The assessment is either carried out by the assessment officer or they will arrange for other HSE employed or approved persons or bodies with experience of the conditions being assessed to carry out assessments on their behalf. The aim of the assessment being to determine what health an educational services will be required to meet the needs of the individual.
At the end of the assessment an assessment report will be produced, this assessment report will have taken into account the needs but not how the needs are to be met. To determine how these needs are to be met the report is forwarded to a Case or Liaison officer who will produce a Service Statement detailing how these needs are to be addressed.
Throughout this process all interested parties come under the broad referral term of stakeholders. In general terms these Stakeholders are made up from the Parents and the School with the addition of the Assessment and Liaison officers, the HSE and all other parties who have been brought into the assessment and statement process.
perhaps some of that might be useful.
As a side note the age of the child might help with any school recommendations.
see also http://www.galwayautismpartnership.com/schooling/ Galway specific and try asking on Boards.ie to reach a wider audience.
Reference for the above http://www.citizensinformation.ie/en/health/health_services_for_people_with_disabilities/assessment_of_need_for_people_with_disabilites.html
Thanks Tony and Christina, for sharing that info.
We moved to Ireland in July with 2 sons with autism. One of the first contacts you want to make is with the SENO (Special Education Needs Officer). They will be the ones who basically decide where you’re children will attend school.You can find a list of SENO’s on http://ncse.ie/seno-contact-list. You’ll want to become very friendly with them. We made contact with them via email even before we moved to Ireland.
Another good resource is ncse, the National Council for Special Education http://ncse.ie/. They have a lot of information that you’ll find helpful.
Another great resource in the North but crosses the border into the south are MiddleTown https://www.middletownautism.com/
I can go on and on, but if you have specific questions just ask away. I’d be happy to help in any way that I can. I’d be happy to share our experience so far.
This is so helpful, Claudia. Thank you for sharing what you’ve learned.
If there are any topics that you think you could cover, I’d be more than happy to publish them on the site. And if not, thank you for your offer to answer questions from the readers.
I hope your move is off to a great start 🙂
Best wishes,
Liam
New education guides for parents of children with special needs news report.
http://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/new-education-guides-for-parents-of-children-with-special-needs-717870.html