Special Educational Needs

The WALK peer model is the cornerstone of the Government's WALK peer ability programme for young people with special educational needs. The programme was developed as a supported transition model in 2013 with the aim of bridging the gap between leaving special school and successfully transitioning to further education, training or employment. This unique model has been supporting young people in my constituency of Louth for many years. It has faced down potential closure on more than one occasion and it manages on piecemeal annual funding. In spite of all these obstacles, it has thrived and grown. We have heard multiple Ministers and Governments tell this Chamber that inclusion will be at the heart of everything they do in breaking down barriers to ensure everyone is provided with opportunities to reach their potential. Clearly, this does not apply to young people in my constituency; it certainly does not extend to students in Drogheda, who are set to lose the vital WALK peer ability programme due to the Government cutting the funding this December. Inara is a young autistic girl who is thriving in Ballymakenny College in Drogheda with the support of the WALK peer programme. Her parents told me that WALK peer brought her from darkness into light and that it is the reason she stopped crying going to school. She is in sixth year and they are now at their wits' end, having been told she may lose this support. They are very worried about what will happen when she leaves school without the programme's support. This cruel decision has far-reaching consequences for Inara and many other young people. The Government has decided young people in Louth and beyond will not have this vital support beyond December. It has decided to end this lifeline for young people with additional needs, with no commitment to even finishing out the academic year. The decision to end the WALK peer supported transitions programme in our schools is wrong, the failure to continue providing vital post-school careers and employment facilitator supports to these young people is wrong and the decision to essentially disregard the findings and recommendations of the PASTEL report is wrong. This programme is not merely an educational piece to be led by educators. As the Ministers well know, the WALK peer careers and employment facilitators play a vital and unique role. They co-ordinate and support the student, family, school, further education or training provider and prospective employers, while ensuring a person-centred pathway. Who decided young people with disabilities or additional needs in school like Ballymakenny College do not deserve to know what will happen to their programme beyond December? What rationale was used to justify abandoning an evidence-led model that makes a meaningful difference to the lives of young people with additional needs who already face so many barriers? Will the Minister of State and the Government put their money where their mouth is in the upcoming budget and support the submission made by WALK to fund this vital support into the future? Will they give a commitment to parents and young people in Drogheda and beyond that the programme will be funded for this entire academic year and that young people like Inara will not be abandoned? Will they urgently engage with WALK to discuss the future of the WALK peer model in a meaningful way and explore how it can complement, integrate and guide the work Government does when it comes to the national transitions policy? I am sickened to my stomach to even have to raise this here tonight. As cruel blows go, this latest stroke by Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, targeting some of our most vulnerable young people, is the lowest of the low. To give a lifeline to somebody who desperately needs it and then snatch it back is just rotten to the core.

I thank the Deputy for the question. The programme for Government includes a number of commitments relevant to students attending special schools. These include the development and strengthening of bridges from special schools into employment. This is a priority commitment for the Government, as seen in the National Human Rights Strategy for Disabled People 2025-2030. An interdepartmental steering group co-chaired by the Department of Education and Youth, the Department of Children, Disability and Equality and the Department of Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science has been established to oversee this work. A priority action for the group is the development of a national policy on transitions. This work is ongoing and a report is expected by the end of this year. Over the past four years, the Department of Education and Youth, in partnership with the National Council of Special Education, NCSE, and Walkinstown Association for People with an Intellectual Disability, or WALK, has been testing two different approaches to a transitions support model. A teacher-led programme has been operating in 41 special schools as part of the Department's response to the comprehensive employment strategy for disabled people. The WALK peer ability transitions programme, to which the Deputy refers in the question, is currently supporting ten schools, including seven special schools and three post-primary schools in Dublin, Louth, Cork, Cavan and Westmeath. This programme is delivered by careers and employment facilitators who work directly with students in their final two years of school but also support the students for a further three years post-school. Both pilot programmes finished in June. Both programmes have been externally evaluated and were the subject of very positive feedback from all the participant schools and stakeholders more broadly. Both evaluations recommended the expansion of a transitions type model of support to students. In relation to the WALK peer model specifically, funding of €2 million has been provided through the Dormant Accounts Fund, DAF, over the past four years to support the programme in the ten schools. The programme is fully funded until December 2026. To provide a continuum of support until June 2027 for students supported by WALK who left school in 2026, the Department has submitted an application through the DAF 2027 for additional funding and a decision is expected shortly. In addition, a number of Departments have received a submission from WALK to extend and expand the programme over the next four years. While the outcomes of the programme are positive, the scalability of the model to all special schools over the next number of years is limited relatively and the scalability of the teacher-led CES transitions model. Based on the outcomes of both pilot programmes and subject to the total funding available, the Minister, Deputy Naughton, and the Minister of State, Deputy Moynihan, announced a new transitions support service for all special schools in June this year. The purpose of the new service is to support young people with disabilities as they prepare to move from school into further education, training, employment and other post-school opportunities and pathways. In addition, the focus of schools’ work can be on supporting transitions into the school. The service is being rolled out to all special schools from this month and will be managed by the NCSE. The service provides each special school with 34 transition support teaching days per year. This flexible allocation will allow schools to deliver transition support at the times it is needed most throughout the school year. Again, I thank the Deputy for raising this very important issue.

I note that the Minister of State spoke about giving people the best possible care and services they require. I hope it is not lost on the Minister of State that WALK peer has dramatically changed the lives of young people with special educational needs in my constituency and other counties. Countless young people have availed of the programme. In most cases, it has literally been a lifeline for young persons and their families. The recent PASTEL report from DCU undertaken by Dr. Scanlon provides compelling evidence that the WALK peer supported transition model is a high-impact, cost-efficient and policy-aligned model for improving outcomes for young people with disabilities. Maybe if the Department of education had attended the launch in DCU last November to which it was invited, it might know that itself and it might not have made the decision to cut this funding. If the Government is serious about developing its national transition policy in the context of the national human rights strategy for disabled people, then it has to get more serious about engaging with WALK and about integrating or complementing the WALK peer model into this planning. As a TD who meets families of young people with disabilities and additional needs on a regular basis, I can tell the Minister of State that many of these families are oblivious and frankly are not remotely interested in lofty policy documents or interagency reports. What they know is that they have had to battle to access services for their children from a young age. That battle is constant. From assessment of need to special school places and SNA provision, the list goes on. This Government decision is another slap in the face to these families and an absolute insult to young people with disabilities or additional needs who rely on the WALK peer programme. This decision can and must be scrapped. I again ask the Minister of State to take it back to his colleagues. I have three main asks of him tonight, namely, to commit to interim funding beyond December to ensure that the programme runs for the entire academic year that they are currently availing of the supports at the moment, scrap the winding-up of the programme and provide funding to continue the project as set out in the WALK submission to the Government and urgently meet with WALK to meaningfully discuss the future of the programme with a particular focus on the post-school needs of young people currently in the programme. For an Aire, I have pages and pages of other testimonies from parents who are suffering the same worry at this time.

The Deputy wants the best possible outcome. That is what we all want. In relation to the WALK peer model specifically, the Deputy wants more funding. I will bring her views back to the Minister. The provision of transition supports for students in school is a key priority for the Government and the Department. As I outlined, there is a commitment, as the Deputy said, under the National Human Rights Strategy for Disabled People 2025-2030. The first programme plan of action 2025 will see the work within the Government and with others to improve retention rates and progression for disabled children and young people as they deal with transitions within education. Both pilot programmes have identified the need for a transition support model for students with a disability and recognise the importance of interagency collaboration. Both programmes have been welcomed by participant schools and widely considered as hugely beneficial to the sector. The provision of time and staffing to schools has afforded them the opportunity to work directly with the students in their final years in school to develop individualised transition plans. Reports from schools suggest that a dedicated transition planning programme relates directly to better outcomes for students. The new transition programme will build on the pilots and should be seen as a first step in providing transition support to students in special schools. Again, I thank the Deputy for raising this issues. I will bring her concerns, ideas and views back to the Minister.