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accessing additional support in school without diagnosis

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  • 23-12-2019 4:18pm
    #1
    Ferdijoe
    Registered Users Posts: 2 ✭


    Hello,

    I have been overseas for a long time but am returning to Ireland in the summer time. My daughter will be 5 this August and I have a place for her in a local National School which has 4 special needs teachers and autism facilities.

    She was never officially diagnosed with ASD but it is a fairly obvious case of high functioning autism. She has been receiving early intervention services from private service providers since she was 2 and has been attending kindergarten but with a dedicated 1:1 teaching assistant in the class room.

    My concern is: somebody mentioned that she would not be able to avail of the autism support in school in Ireland without having an official HSE diagnosis. And that an official diagnosis takes a very long time. I tried to contact the school but was unable to get a response. Can anybody confirm if this is likely to be the case? If so, is there anything I could do to speed things up? (e.g., overseas diagnosis? private clinic diagnosis? or getting on the waiting list for an assessment while we are still overseas?)


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    #2
    lsjmhar
    Closed Accounts Posts: 399 ✭✭lsjmhar


    Schools now receive a blanket allocation of resource teaching support which can be distributed amongst children with additional needs in school. These resources are based on international prevalence rates - Dept of ed estimate of asd in population is 1.55%. The distribution of these resources is now at the discretion of the School Principal. However, the principal will need assessment information to determine how they allocate their resource hours.

    The Dept of ed is also changing its allocation of Special needs assistant support based on this model in September 2020 so schools should have enough sna support for children with additional needs. The level of resource and sna support will depend on school size naturally. SImilarly, the principal will need assessment information to determine the level of sna support a child will need and receive.

    You would benefit from referring your child to the appropriate school age team ( follow on service from early intervention) even if the waitlist is long.

    Also, welcome home!!!


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    #3
    Ferdijoe
    Registered Users Posts: 2 ✭Ferdijoe


    lsjmhar wrote: »
    Schools now receive a blanket allocation of resource teaching support which can be distributed amongst children with additional needs in school. These resources are based on international prevalence rates - Dept of ed estimate of asd in population is 1.55%. The distribution of these resources is now at the discretion of the School Principal. However, the principal will need assessment information to determine how they allocate their resource hours.

    The Dept of ed is also changing its allocation of Special needs assistant support based on this model in September 2020 so schools should have enough sna support for children with additional needs. The level of resource and sna support will depend on school size naturally. SImilarly, the principal will need assessment information to determine the level of sna support a child will need and receive.

    You would benefit from referring your child to the appropriate school age team ( follow on service from early intervention) even if the waitlist is long.

    Also, welcome home!!!

    Thanks Isjmhar. The principal has discretion as to how the resources are allocated. If I understand correctly: My daughter will probably not have an official HSE diagnosis until nearly the end of her junior infants year, but she may still be available to avail of resources as long as the principal agrees that she needs additional support, assuming the school is sufficiently resourced.


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    #4
    DubCount
    Registered Users Posts: 1,065 ✭✭✭DubCount


    Ferdijoe wrote: »
    Hello,

    I have been overseas for a long time but am returning to Ireland in the summer time. My daughter will be 5 this August and I have a place for her in a local National School which has 4 special needs teachers and autism facilities.

    She was never officially diagnosed with ASD but it is a fairly obvious case of high functioning autism. She has been receiving early intervention services from private service providers since she was 2 and has been attending kindergarten but with a dedicated 1:1 teaching assistant in the class room.

    My concern is: somebody mentioned that she would not be able to avail of the autism support in school in Ireland without having an official HSE diagnosis. And that an official diagnosis takes a very long time. I tried to contact the school but was unable to get a response. Can anybody confirm if this is likely to be the case? If so, is there anything I could do to speed things up? (e.g., overseas diagnosis? private clinic diagnosis? or getting on the waiting list for an assessment while we are still overseas?)

    Get a diagnosis. Go private if you can afford it as its quicker.

    There is always more demand for supports, than availability. A diagnosis is your only weapon to fight for supports for your child.


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    #5
    byhookorbycrook
    Moderators, Education Moderators, Regional South East Moderators Posts: 12,475 Mod ✭✭✭✭byhookorbycrook


    lsjmhar wrote: »
    Schools now receive a blanket allocation of resource teaching support which can be distributed amongst children with additional needs in school. These resources are based on international prevalence rates - Dept of ed estimate of asd in population is 1.55%. The distribution of these resources is now at the discretion of the School Principal. However, the principal will need assessment information to determine how they allocate their resource hours.

    The Dept of ed is also changing its allocation of Special needs assistant support based on this model in September 2020 so schools should have enough sna support for children with additional needs. The level of resource and sna support will depend on school size naturally. SImilarly, the principal will need assessment information to determine the level of sna support a child will need and receive.

    You would benefit from referring your child to the appropriate school age team ( follow on service from early intervention) even if the waitlist is long.

    Also, welcome home!!!
    The SNA system has been broken and this "new model" will kill it. The DES use "Access" to an SNA as a cover-all. One SNA can be expected to cover a number of children across different classrooms.:mad::mad:
    Allocating resources by the size of the school alone is crazy. Some schools may not need the allocation they get, while other schools are ridiculously under-resourced.
    The DES say that you don't need a diagnosis, yet to gain access to an SNA,realistically, you do.
    Part of how resources are allocated depends on standardized test scores, so a school that has worked hard to improve literacy and numeracy actually lose out. :mad::mad::mad:


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    #6
    IvoryTower
    Registered Users Posts: 3,825 ✭✭✭IvoryTower


    DubCount wrote: »
    Get a diagnosis. Go private if you can afford it as its quicker.

    Agreed. We went private, He was diagnosed. We then applied for Domiciliary Care Allowance and the tax credits, so you actually get the money back and more within a few months. Well worth it. We're now going to use his dca to get him some private help rather than always on waiting lists.


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    #7
    Calhoun
    Registered Users Posts: 7,447 ✭✭✭Calhoun


    Get the AON done if you can, private diagnosis are great and we availed of that but we also did the public version. It also doesn't take a super long time because there are statutory timelimits they must hit or you can take them to court to compel them to do it.

    Why? if you need to avail of public services without the piece of paper through their system you have a battle too fight for support. We had our private diagnosis done by the same people that the HSE use but they rejected ours and did their own with them.

    Additionally, we are getting to the stage in the law where AON service statement judgement are being used to determine additional services. Your child could benefit from those.

    Finally the language required in reports to get support is very specific, the SENO can and will use to either grant or deny support for your child. Our girl is non-verbal, a flight risk, and also not toilet trained and our SENO didn't give her SnA support until the principal had a go at him.

    I am not sure how these reports will factor into the new system but the diagnosis reports need to be written well.


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    #8
    byhookorbycrook
    Moderators, Education Moderators, Regional South East Moderators Posts: 12,475 Mod ✭✭✭✭byhookorbycrook


    She won’t get into a school ASD unit without a diagnosis. The allocation of special education teachers was based on the school population at the time - there have been no extra teaching hours in most schools, even if several children with significant needs have entered the school since .

    The new SNA model will be the same . It makes no sense that every school with say, 150 children get x numbers of SNAs- school A mightn’t need any SNAs, school b might need 3 .

    Both models have been spun to parents to make it seem that every child with additional needs will be provided for . The reality will be very different.

    AON was supposed to be carried out in a very short time frame , now some children are waiting for years .


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    #9
    Calhoun
    Registered Users Posts: 7,447 ✭✭✭Calhoun


    Legal action can be taken on the AON if you need and can afford. They have actually recently changed the AON, would suggest reading up on it.


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    #10
    Salty
    Registered Users Posts: 2,116 ✭✭✭Salty


    If you are going to go the private diagnosis route - make sure the assessment is carried out by a multidisciplinary team who use gold standard tools such as ADOS, ADI-R, DISCO etc. You can google the NICE guidelines which describe best practice in relation to a plethora of health-related matters, including diagnosis of ASD. A private diagnosis generally helps with getting resources in school, and in my experience it is the schools going to great lengths to support children as the health services are so excessively over-subscribed.

    However, a private diagnosis does not satisfy the HSE when it comes to children accessing MDT services (not in my area of the country anyway). You can refer your child through AON for an assessment. People are waiting years for these assessments when they should only be waiting a few months so be proactive - if the statutory time expires and your child has not been assessed, make a formal complaint to speed things up.

    It is shameful that parents have to constantly complain to get essential services for their children but this is the reality unfortunately.


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    #11
    Calhoun
    Registered Users Posts: 7,447 ✭✭✭Calhoun


    _meehan_ wrote: »
    If you are going to go the private diagnosis route - make sure the assessment is carried out by a multidisciplinary team who use gold standard tools such as ADOS, ADI-R, DISCO etc. You can google the NICE guidelines which describe best practice in relation to a plethora of health-related matters, including diagnosis of ASD. A private diagnosis generally helps with getting resources in school, and in my experience it is the schools going to great lengths to support children as the health services are so excessively over-subscribed.

    However, a private diagnosis does not satisfy the HSE when it comes to children accessing MDT services (not in my area of the country anyway). You can refer your child through AON for an assessment. People are waiting years for these assessments when they should only be waiting a few months so be proactive - if the statutory time expires and your child has not been assessed, make a formal complaint to speed things up.

    It is shameful that parents have to constantly complain to get essential services for their children but this is the reality unfortunately.

    Its funny, we got an assessment done by caint in Naas. The HSE was like no we cannot accept that. We ended up going on the list for AON and it was taking ages and went to our local TD who asked it on the floor of the dail and they expedited it.

    Guess where we ended up getting it done :P, the same place again.


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    #12
    Salty
    Registered Users Posts: 2,116 ✭✭✭Salty


    Calhoun wrote: »
    Its funny, we got an assessment done by caint in Naas. The HSE was like no we cannot accept that. We ended up going on the list for AON and it was taking ages and went to our local TD who asked it on the floor of the dail and they expedited it.

    Guess where we ended up getting it done :P, the same place again.

    Madness!!


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