Mar 2, 2025, The Journal: Minister gives assurance that special school places will be made available to students in need
Hundreds of children with additional needs nationwide have been left without a school place.
SPECIAL EDUCATION MINISTER Michael Moynihan has assured parents that appropriate special education school places will be made available to students in need before the beginning of the next school year.
It comes after parents of children with additional needs demonstrated and staged a 24-hour ‘sleep out’ this week outside of the Department of Education requesting that immediate attention be brought to the lack of suitable and available school spaces.
Hundreds of children with additional needs nationwide have been left without a school place or certainty of enrollment next year due to a shortage in the necessary spaces and classes in the Irish education system.
Those who have been able to secure a place are sometimes required to travel long distances, as their immediate school-catchment area does not have the necessary resources to meet a student’s additional needs.
The National Council for Special Education (NCSE) estimates that roughly 130 students are currently in need of a school place, though campaigners and activists claim that figure is much higher and will only climb as the years continue.
Parents met outside the Department of Education in Dublin on Friday to protest, demonstrate and share their stories about how the lack of resources has impacted their families, children and their education.
Sarah Hennessy was present to advocate on behalf of her autistic son, Freddie. Addressing those gathered, she said her experience as a mother has been “heartbreaking”.
“Witnessing your child being failed is something I wouldn’t wish on anyone,” Hennessy told the large group of parents, children and supporters in Dublin on Friday.
Asked about the event on RTÉ One Television’s The Week in Politics programme today, Minister of State for Special Education Michael Moynihan said he has been engaging with the NCSE on the issue since he began in his role earlier this year.
Moynihan said that the issue has been one of his main priorities and that senior officials in his Department and the NCSE will “make sure that we are going to ensure that places are available”.
“Children need the best and the most-suitable places – not travelling long distances but, in so far as we possibly can, [offer school places] within their own communities,” he said.
He claimed that more than 200 new spaces have already been approved and that more will come before government next week for further approval. He said that the majority of spaces already approved will be effective from the beginning of September 2025. . . .
Social Democrats TD Jennifer Whitmore, party spokesperson for children said that there will be “an awful lot” of parents who will not accept the minister’s assurances, given the promises which have been made to them in the past.
She said that the parties that make up the current government were aware of this issue during the last Dáil term, and could have made decisions to elevate the matter and approve spaces more urgently.
Whitmore also pointed to the over 14,000 children which still require an assessment of needs – which is often necessary for parents to obtain in order to secure a place in a special education school – and that it may further worsen waiting lists.
She said: “I hope the Minister is getting on top of this because, for parents and children who have additional needs, life is hard enough for them as it is.
“They shouldn’t have to fight. They shouldn’t have to sleep out. They shouldn’t have to have their stories raised in the Dáil to have their constitutional right.”
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