School principals in Tipperary and across the country should be allowed to apply to upgrade their special educational needs classrooms.
The issue was raised in the Seanad this week by local Senator Garret Ahearn who said many such classrooms are badly in need of improvement.
He cited Ardfinnan National School as a prime example of this and called on Minister for Special Education Josepha Madigan to look into the matter.
“I think it will be beneficial for the Department to look at those rooms and those classrooms separately in terms of schemes because we’re going to get to a stage where…like Ardfinnan National School would have been very early on for any primary school to have one of these classrooms. It accommodates about 32 of their kids which is about 10% of the whole school.
“I think we should have a scheme available within the Department of Education to predominately just focus essentially on Special Education rather than having it in the whole scheme of upgrading classrooms.”
Minister Josepha Madigan said she would be amenable to such an idea and also happy to come to the Premier County.
“I would be delighted to accept your invitation to come down to Tipperary and particularly to Ardfinnan National School.
“I’ve met the wonderful Cara Darmody and I’m sure she did incredible in her Junior Cert maths – she’s to be commended. But the school in particular is to be commended and it sounds like they’re quite advanced in terms of their inclusivity policy and how they have integrated children with additional needs within the school community which is really what we want to see. They seem like a role model in that regard so I’d be absolutely delighted to come down.”
