Norma Foley seeking funding for additional 1,500 SNAs in upcoming Budget

The minister has spoken publicly about her want to prioritise special needs education in the upcoming budget.

It is believed that she will push for an additional 350 special classes, which would come on stream for September 2025.

Currently there are 21,000 SNAs in the education system and 3,400 special classes.

For each special class with six children, two SNAs and a special education teacher is needed.

While 700 of the additional 1,500 SNAs would be employed for these extra classes, the rest will be needed for mainstream classes that have pupils will additional educational needs.

“The hope would be that the case will be strongly made that this is a real need and hopefully the funds can be found for them,” a source close to the minister said.

Speaking at an event that marked 100 years of the Department of Education, Minister Foley said special education was a “priority” and said €2.7bn of the Department’s budget is spent on special education.

“Obviously, we’d like to see that more and more grow and we’d like to see more and more equality of opportunity there as well. So that’s a priority,” Minister Foley said.

This September saw the roll out of free schoolbooks for secondary school students in the junior cycle.

Minister Foley has said she would now like to see the free schoolbook scheme rolled out to schools in the senior cycle.