Special education target welcome, but will need firm commitment from Govt

The Green Party today welcomed the Government’s long-awaited response to the review of special education, but sounded a note of caution about how its changes would be implemented without new funding.

 

“There are some very positive recommendations in the Government’s response which the Green Party is pleased to support,” Green Party Education and Disability Spokesperson Catherine Delahunty said.

 

“I am pleased to see a target being set that 80 percent of all schools will be fully inclusive to students with special needs by 2014, with the remaining 20 percent to follow.

 

“In June, the Education Review Office found that only half of all schools are fully inclusive and welcoming to children with disabilities. This is far too low.

 

“I support the move towards a model in which all schools are inclusive and welcoming. Under the current regime, some children are finding mainstream schools to be hostile environments, and we need to change this rather than ghettoise special needs children in separate schools.

 

“However, significant funding will be needed to help the 50 percent of schools who are not fully inclusive at the moment to up their game by 2014. I am concerned that the funding announced by Associate Minister of Education Rodney Hide this afternoon is from previous Budgets and has already been allocated.

 

“Without a real commitment in the form of Government financial support, many schools will struggle to meet this target,” Ms Delahunty said.

 

Ms Delahunty also emphasised the importance of teacher training and said the Government response was light on details about how it would ensure that teachers are properly trained to work with special needs children.

 

“If all schools are to become inclusive, then all teachers need to be fully trained for this. This needs to be a compulsory part of all teacher training, not just an optional unit as it is currently. Ideally this training should be conducted by people with disabilities.

 

“There is little detail in the documents released by the Government today. It would be helpful if the entire review of special education could be publicly released so that parents, teachers and communities can better judge where the gaps are and assess how well the Government response will fill them.

 

“Ultimately more inclusive schools will bring benefits to the whole community. A fair society is better for everyone, and that starts with including all our children,” Ms Delahunty said.