A PRIMARY SCHOOL in north Dublin is in limbo over its providing of autism classes due to the Department of Education declining to provide funding for modular units to facilitate the intake of the children.

Stapolin Educate Together National School (Stapolin ETNS) in Baldoyle has been attempting to set up two additional classes but does not have space within its current building to do so, and has appealed to the Department to fund the units. 

The school’s principal, Clodagh Farrell, said schools “are being pushed into constant reshuffling, temporary fixes, and crisis management, all while trying to meet the complex needs of their pupils”.

Stapolin ETNS is a mainstream school that has 347 students, with 12 students split between the two autism classes.

Opened in 2019, the school moved to its permanent building in August 2023. It is under the patronage of Educate Together.

The school has taken to converting store cupboards into special education teaching (SET) classrooms and bathrooms into regulation and sensory spaces. 

The school identified the need for two additional autism classes to provide for children in their local community who are currently waiting on a school place. Each autism class can only cater for six children.

Eight children with additional needs are being educated in the school’s mainstream stream. All eight have letters from the National Council for Special Education (NCSE) that are meant to guarantee them an appropriate school place.

A further 50 children in the school’s immediate catchment area are on a waiting list.

The school is already at capacity and has no unused classrooms.

Following a campaign launched by the school last year, the Department informed the school that, in principle, the two additional classes can be sanctioned, but said it could not provide for two modular units to host the classes.

The principal said that without these units, there is simply no space to hold the additional classes despite the need for them locally.

“No school would ever be told to open two mainstream classes and just figure out the space. No principal would be expected to place mainstream children in a toilet, a corridor or a former cleaning cupboard, yet this is precisely what is being normalised when it comes to autistic children,” she said.

“Environment matters for all children, but it matters especially for autistic children.”

The Department has informed the school that it’s trying to arrange for autism classes to be opened in schools that have existing space that is suitable for conversion rather than the funding of modular units.

In a reply to a Parliamentary Question submitted by local TD Cian O’Callaghan, Minister of State at the Department of Education Michael Moynihan said the Department and the NCSE is working with schools to provide more autism classes.

Moynihan said that the vast majority of new special classes being announced are “being provided in available school accommodation which is being reconfigured as a special class”.

All five Dublin Bay North TDs have backed the school’s calls for the Department to provide two modular units for the classes.

A joint statement signed by TDs Tom Brazabon, Barry Heneghan, Denise Mitchell, Cian O’Callaghan, and Naoise Ó Muirí said the school has sufficient space on its grounds for the units and experienced staff ready to support the opening of the two classes.

“With a huge demand in the local area, it is essential that these modular units are approved without delay,” they said.

“Without new classroom space, it is simply not possible to provide these children with an appropriate school place. Every practical requirement has been met by the school. The only outstanding issue is the approval for the modular buildings.

“Children with autism have the same right to an education as any other child. They cannot be left waiting any longer.”