I thank the committee for the invitation. In the context of Ireland’s ratification of Article 24 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, UNCRPD, on the right to inclusive education, the NCSE’s advice on the progressive realisation of inclusive education, the Education for Persons with Special Educational Needs, EPSEN, Act review implementation plan, the EU technical support instrument on fostering inclusive quality education, the Education Therapy Service, ETS, initiative, the special needs assistant, SNA, workforce plan, the expansion in specialist provision, and the Céim standards, the expectations on teacher education are onerous and increasing. We know that children in the system are experiencing exclusion, expulsion, suspension, reduced timetables, distress, trauma and school avoidance.
Building on a tradition going back to 1961 in St. Patrick’s College, Drumcondra, the DCU Institute of Education has a dedicated school of inclusive and special education with 20 academics and a research centre focusing on inclusive pedagogy, with staff supervising 40 doctoral students in the area. The school contributes to the faculty’s initial teacher education programmes alongside other schools and offers nine post-graduate programmes in inclusive and special education to teachers and others.
Internationally, some countries have separate teaching qualifications for general and special education teachers at initial teacher education level, while others have mandatory post-graduate qualifications in inclusive and special education or in aspects, such as for special educational needs co-ordinators, SENCOs, deaf education or vision impairment.
We have a different approach. All teachers are expected to be qualified to teach all learners in initial teacher education, ITE. There is optional access to limited postgraduate qualifications alongside non-accredited CPD opportunities.
Graduates from primary and post-primary ITE programmes have been considered to have appropriate competence to teach in a range of teaching roles, including special class, special school and special education teacher. In terms of advancing inclusive education in teaching in DCU, all 12 of our initial teacher education programmes and early childhood programmes have core elements in inclusive education in line with Teaching Council accreditation processes. It is promoted in the widest sense as a core value and principle across disability and special educational needs, educational disadvantage, gender, religion and ethical education, sexual orientation, intercultural education, linguistically diverse learners, anti-racism and human rights education. The approach uses a combination of discrete modules, embedded, permeated approaches where inclusive education and social justice are integrated into the programmes and opportunities in placement for application and reflection and in specialist elective modules. An innovative pathway, which is a first in any university, for deaf Irish Sign Language users to become primary teachers has resulted in the first graduates of this programme in 2023.
In terms of research advancing inclusive education and equality, DCU Institute of Education has dedicated research centres with a strong social justice and equality orientation. Professional placements are a significant element of our programmes, where students undertake practice in early childhood, primary school or further education settings as part of their studies. These include special class and school settings.
However, there is a clear tension emerging between more inclusive forms of teaching and learning, and the demand for further separate provision in the system in the form of special schools and classes. From a situation where Ireland had 2% of the student population in separate provision, this figure is now heading for over 5%. This increase in separate provision is problematic from an educational, social, ethical and human rights perspective. Our responsibility is to teach teachers for all contexts, and to meet the needs of all learnings, but also as reflective and agentic professionals in questioning the assumptions underpinning policies and practices in schools that may lead to unnecessary separation.
A key consideration in terms of values, skills and knowledge is what is appropriate at initial teacher education level and what is best developed at induction and continuing professional learning. There is a huge demand among teachers for accredited professional learning. Our school offers nine postgraduate programmes. These cover intellectual disability, dyslexia, autism, inclusive and special education, neuro-affirmative leadership and gifted education. Two of the programmes are funded by the Department of Education and Youth, namely, the graduate diploma in inclusive special education and the graduate certificate in autism education. Some 566 teachers since 2021 have applied for 110 places on the graduate certificate in autism education. The number of yearly places, at 18, has not changed since 2004. On the graduate diploma in inclusive education, over the past six years 212 teachers have applied each year for 115 places, with five more places added this year. The evidence from completion of the programmes points to increased confidence, competence and skills of teachers.
To realise inclusive education in the widest sense in local schools, we need a transformational programme of professional learning at a systems level. It needs to move beyond a focus on individual competence to capacity building and shaping the conditions which support inclusive teaching and learning. It requires an intersectional, rights-based equality approach. It needs to offer sustained critical and reflective professional learning that is context-sensitive. Inclusive education is fundamental to how we see the purposes of education and the importance of learning to live together as much as learning to know and to do. It is foundational for a republic that values democracy, social cohesion and economic justice.
