AQW 21964/22-27 Written question to the Minister of Education
To ask the Minister of Education to detail any strategies being implemented to address workforce shortages in key special educational needs services, including educational psychologists, speech and language therapists and specialist teaching staff.
Asked by Claire Sugden MLA on 5 February 2025
- Answered
- Written
- Tabled
- 5 February 2025
- Answer due by
- 20 February 2025
- Answered
- 17 February 202512 days after tabling
- Department
- Department of Education
- Priority question
- No
Answer
I published my Special Educational Needs (SEN) Reform Agenda and Delivery Plan on 4 February 2025, which is designed to meet the needs of children with SEN by addressing, among others, the issues raised in your question.
As part of the Right People aspect of my Delivery Plan, I am committed to increasing the Educational Psychologist (EP) workforce and to working closely with Health and Social Care (HSC) services to ensure that the necessary resources are available to all children and young people with SEN.
Since 2006, the department has funded student places on the Doctorate in Educational, Child and Adolescent Psychology (DECAP) course at Queens University Belfast (QUB). The DECAP is the only professional training course in educational psychology within Northern Ireland and it provides the relevant qualification to enable registration as a practitioner.
The funding of this course ensures a sufficient pool of suitably qualified EPs to enable the Education Authority (EA) to meet its statutory obligations in line with the SEN and Disability (SEND) (Northern Ireland) Order 2005 and the SEND Act 2016 and respond to the good practice guidelines within the department’s Code of Practice on the Identification and Assessment of SEN.
I will be trialling and implementing a Speech, Language and Communication Programme designed to deliver early intervention for emerging needs. This will be aided by the introduction of toolkits to assist speech and language therapists.
The training and development of specialist teaching staff will be informed by my child-centred Integrated Workforce Planning Framework. I will also explore a wide range of options designed to recruit and develop high-quality SEN practitioners who can offer the right support at the right time for the children and young people of Northern Ireland.