Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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296. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills the estimated full-year cost of a new staff member in each education and training board to promote disabled students’ participation; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [28855/24]

Hildegarde Naughton (Galway West, Fine Gael)
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Enabling children with special educational needs to receive an education is a priority for this government. It is also a key priority for my department and for the National Council for Special Education (NCSE).

My department provides each of the sixteen Education and Training Board (ETB) with a staffing allocation to support its schools, colleges, head office and other centres of education. In providing these supports, it is the responsibility of each ETB to recruit and manage staffing levels within this allocation and to deploy staff in roles in accordance with the priorities and needs as identified by the ETB concerned.

The average salary cost of a post-primary teacher is approximately €70,140. Therefore if each ETB were to employ an additional staff member at this rate the annual cost would be in the region of €1,122,240.