Education Authority apologies to around 300 SEN children still waiting for school placement

The Education Authority (EA) has apologised to almost 300 families with children who have special educational statements and are still waiting for confirmation of a school placement.

In an interview with UTV, the education body said work to provide families will continue over the summer holidays and that the number of children still waiting "will be reduced in the coming weeks".

As of Thursday 27th June, 3,339 children who are at transition periods of nursery, primary one and year 8 have been placed, while around 270 are still waiting.

One of those children affected is Alison McClean's son, Jackson.

He has a special educational needs statement and is currently at a mainstream school where he has a full-time 1-2-1 assistant.

His mum has been advised however that he would benefit from accessing a specialist setting. So far there has been no update to his application.

"I don’t want him to be anxious over the summer break not knowing what school he’ll be going to. Even for simple things like knowing what uniform I should be buying him," explained Alison.

St Columban’s primary in Kilkeel is a unique educational setting in Northern Ireland.

It opened as a mainstream school in 2018 but subsequently added specialist facilities for children with special educational needs.

“In terms of scale of what we did we went form staff of 23/24 we went to 44/45 overnight," Principal Julian Kelly told UTV.

"A lot of children are non-verbal and not toilet trained so the learning was steep but as a school it’s the best thing we have ever done.

“The mainstream children do not see any difference with those children, they are part of their school, and they gain as much as the children who are in the provision."

For parents like Andrew Cunningham, who live in Kilkeel, the school has been a great success for children. His eldest son is in the mainstream P4 class and his youngest son, Shay who has Autism Spectrum Disorder, is in the P2 early years class.

"I can't express how grateful we are to have this facility on our doorstep," he told UTV.

"Shay's development has been very rapid over the last two years, a big thing was his loss of speech at around a year and a half, but now he has full speech.

"It's not only the social skills he's been taught with his friends, but he's also up to speed with where he should be in terms of his learning development at six years of age should be."

Elaine Craig is the interim assistant director of special educational needs statutory services within children and young peoples' services at the EA.

“The majority of our children who have a statement will be in mainstream with support and others who will be in specialist provision and then others in special schools," she told UTV.

"Over the last number of months 3,339 children who are at transition periods of nursery, primary one and year 8 - we still have around 270 yet to place, I’m sorry we’re in that position, I wish they were in a position where they were placed and knew now, that number will reduce in coming weeks."

When asked if all outstanding placements would be issued by the start of the new school term, Ms Craig said: "It would be wrong of me to be absolutely say for sure - but what I will say is that we will have all of our children placed within the next academic year, and work is ongoing over the summer and it will happen to ensure schools are ready for those children and to ensure we have children in place."