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Special Education Teacher Allocation 2024/2025 explained
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A special education teacher provides additional teaching to children attending mainstream classes with special educational needs. Special education teachers use a wide range of teaching approaches to meet a variety of student needs. This ensures that children with special educational needs in mainstream education are supported in their education journey.
All mainstream schools are allocated special education teaching hours for this purpose through the special education teacher allocation. Schools decide how to best use these hours so that students with the highest level of need get the highest level of support.
There are 14,600 special education teachers supporting children in mainstream classes in our primary and post-primary schools – the highest number ever following an increase of 1,000 special education teachers in 2021. Special education teacher hours are allocated to schools per week based on the level of need in each school across the country.
In addition to these 14,600 special education teachers, there are 4,750 teachers in special schools and special classes. There are also 21,000 special needs assistants supporting the care needs of students in our mainstream and special schools.
The Department of Education uses an allocation model to decide how to fairly distribute 14,600 special education teachers across mainstream schools. Schools receive a number of special education teaching hours per week, based on the level of need in each of the 4,000 schools across the country.
The allocation model introduced in 2017 moved away from a diagnosis led system to an identified need driven system. This gave schools greater autonomy to use special education teacher hours to meet identified learning needs in mainstream classes so that students with the highest level of need get the highest level of support.
The model used 5 inputs: the number of children enrolled in schools; data from the HSE for certain children entering junior infant classes (complex needs data); the scores of pupils in standard educational tests; social disadvantage; and gender.
The model relied on data being given to the Department of Education from the HSE’s Children’s Disability Network Teams on children entering junior infants with special education needs who had been assessed by the HSE or were waiting for an assessment by the HSE. This became known as complex needs data.
However this data was not consistently returned and for the 2023/24 school year only 5 per cent of verifiable data was returned from the HSE’s Children’s Disability Network Teams. This meant that the large number of schools who did not benefit from this data return would miss out on special education teacher hours compared to the small number of schools who did benefit from this data return.
The 2017 model was based on research available at the time which indicated that male pupils had a greater level of identified need for special education. Therefore, a specific portion of hours were allocated for male pupils in a school. The evidence since 2017 is that female pupils have the same level of special education need which tends to present later and in different ways.
There has been a limited change made to the allocation model used to distribute special education teaching hours to mainstream classes for the next school year which begins at the end of August/start of September 2024.
The 2024 model will eliminate any differences in allocation based on gender – male and female pupils will be treated equally. The model will also use school-based data, rather than relying on HSE data, to ensure that children with complex needs get the special education support they need.
No existing complex needs hours have been removed from the model. These hours have been maintained and redistributed to schools according to their level of special educational need. The existing allocation for gender has been redistributed to schools across the model.
It is important that special education teaching hours are distributed fairly across schools so that each school can meet the needs of children with special educational needs in their mainstream classes. For this reason, under the 2024 model all children with complex needs are now supported by using reliable school-level data from standardised tests, such as STen tests in primary or the Junior Cycle exams at post-primary, which shows the level of need in each school. To do this the model uses data for those students who are performing at the lower levels in standardised tests or who have been exempted from standardised tests.
The 2024 model rectifies the inequality of the 2017 model where the needs of female pupils with special educational needs were not fully supported and where the needs of all students with complex needs could not be taken into account due to inconsistent HSE data.
1) 68.5 per cent of the special education teaching hours will be allocated based on data for those students who are performing at the lower levels in standardised tests or who have been exempted from standardised tests. This reliably reflects complex needs and literacy & numeracy.
2) 25 per cent of the special education teaching hours will be allocated based on the number of pupils enrolled in a school.
3) 6.5 per cent of the special education teaching hours will be allocated to schools where their students live in disadvantaged areas.
The purpose of the allocation model is to distribute special education teaching hours across mainstream classes in 4,000 schools to ensure that resources are allocated at the right time to the right place, so that these hours are available to schools to match their identified need to support their pupils.
Special education teacher resources are distributed to schools mainly based on complex learning needs (68.5 per cent of the model) across the entire system.
This new system uses high quality and verifiable educational data supplied directly from all 4,000 schools. As with the 2017 allocation model, it remains the case that children in need of special education teacher support do not need to wait for a medical diagnosis to receive this support in school. In addition, children do not need to wait to be assessed by the HSE before their needs will be reflected in the special education teaching hours allocated to their school.
Under the new system, the scores children get in educational tests will determine around two thirds (68.5 per cent) of the special educational teaching hours allocated to their school.
There are children with complex needs who will perform at the lower levels in standardised tests such as sTen tests in primary school or the Junior Cycle exams at post-primary. They will be given the highest weighting in terms of the allocation of special educational teaching hours.
There will also be children with complex needs who cannot take the tests. They will automatically be given the highest weighting in terms of the allocation of special educational teaching hours.
The educational testing is sourced from three primary class year groups (2nd, 4th and 6th classes) together with junior cycle exams at post-primary level, as well as over three school years (2023, 2022 and 2021) so that the information is robust.
The model is designed to ensure that primary and post-primary schools have a fair allocation of special education teaching hours. When the 6th class students leave each year the allocation remains and can support the incoming junior infants. If a school has more junior infants with special educational needs than were in the 6th class who left, then it can seek a review from the National Council for Special Education.
Under the new system, 37 per cent of schools will see an increase in their allocation of special education teaching hours, 30 per cent of schools will retain the same allocation of special education teaching hours and 33 per cent of schools will see a reduction in their special education teaching hours.
Of the schools who will see a reduction in their special education teaching hours, around 70 per cent will see a reduction of 5 hours or less while the remaining 30 per cent of them will see a reduction of more than five hours. Where schools see a reduction in hours, it is largely due to reductions in their pupil numbers or reductions in the level of need of their pupils.
The total available special education teaching hours are distributed to schools across the entire system in the fairest possible way. For example, where a school’s pupil numbers are declining, their special education teaching hours may be redistributed to schools with a growing number of pupils.
A special education teacher allocation was not published each year but rather every 2 to 3 years. As a result, schools with increasing pupil numbers did not get a rapid increase in special education teaching hours. This particularly affected newly established schools with rapidly increasing pupil numbers. Under the 2024 allocation model, schools will receive an allocation each year, so that up-to-date information on pupil numbers and pupil need in each school is used to determine how many special education teaching hours a school is allocated.
Every school is different and can experience unique circumstances. Schools can make an application to the National Council for Special Education between March and May each year to review their allocated hours for special education teachers. These reviews will be completed before the end of the current school year.
The Department of Education undertook an intensive review and stakeholder engagement process. There was a total of 30 meetings held - this included 12 consultation sessions held with the education partners, such as management bodies and staff representatives. The National Council for Special Education also carried out around 40 reviews with individual schools to get their feedback on the updated model. The new model is designed to address the concerns raised by schools in relation to inequities and lack of responsiveness within the previous allocation model.
The review that informed the 2024 allocation model identified that a programme of continuous development was required to ensure that the model was delivering effectively, both in supporting the changing needs in the education system, and for individual schools.
The Department of Education, along with stakeholders, is cognisant that the model needs to continue to evolve so that the special education teacher allocations process takes into account new or improved data sources and other changes within the school system.
The Department intends to undertake further detailed consultations with our education partners in the development of future enhancements to the model. As part of this we will examine an ongoing continuous improvement process that can give schools more input into identifying the need in their school in the most efficient way possible.