This government is fully committed to supporting students with special educational needs to fulfil their full potential and the Programme for Government makes a number of commitments to deliver on this objective.
In 2026, over €3 billion will be spent supporting students with special educational needs. It will ensure that specialist capacity continues to grow by providing 3,000 specialist places. The majority of these places will be available in special classes within mainstream schools. It will increase our special educational posts by 860 special education teacher and over 1,700 special needs assistant (SNA) posts. This will mean we will have almost 46,000 professionals dedicated to supporting students with special educational needs in our schools. This is one of the highest annual increases in posts to date and is a firm reminder of this government’s commitment to supporting students with special educational needs.
Budget 2026 has also afforded a number of new initiatives such as funding for the roll out of the Education Therapy Service (ETS), the introduction of extra special education teaching hours for post-primary schools to support coordination and transition efforts and indeed a special school package to support the unique challenges these schools face.
The Department of Education and Youth and the National Council for Special Education (NCSE) will also, this year, look at the profile of existing special schools. This work will ensure children and young people with complex educational needs can apply to their local special school and not have to travel long distances to access an education that meets their needs.
In order to support the NCSE and forward planning my department published Circular 0039/2025. This circular informs school management and patrons of measures introduced to support forward planning and reiterates the need for parents to inform the NCSE through the Parent Notify process that they are seeking a special educational placement for their child.
This notification process will provide the NCSE with critical information on children who continue to need a special class as they progress to post-primary level as well as details on students who require a place for the first time. This year to facilitate earlier sanctioning of classes for the 2026/27 school year, an earlier date of 1 October was set for parents to complete the process.
For the 2025/26 school year the NCSE advise that a small number of special class places remain in many counties in the country for those still seeking placement. While these places may not be in a preferred school, vacancies do exist.
My department and the NCSE continue to work closely with school patron bodies, school management bodies and schools to confirm new special classes for the next school year 2026/2027. The NCSE began sanctioning new special classes last month, which is several months earlier than last year. 301 have been sanctioned to date and many more new special classes will be confirmed in the coming weeks.
Of the 301 new special classes, 199 are being established in primary schools and 102 in post-primary schools. New special classes are being established in every county with 30 for Cork so far.
My department and the NCSE are committed to delivering an education system that is of the highest quality and where every child and young person feels valued and is actively supported and nurtured to reach their full potential.
