Special Educational Needs Seanad Éireann — 2026-05-27 ============================================================ Linda Nelson Murray (FG), Industrial and Commercial Panel I thank the Minister of State for coming in this morning. I have put in a couple of Commencement matters that involved his Department and he has been very gracious. I appreciate him coming in to answer this today. I met a lady two weeks ago who was looking for some help with her daughter, who is ten years of age and has been diagnosed with dyslexia. The psychologist recommended that she get a laptop for school but she was refused by the special educational needs organiser, SENO. When I asked why, I was told that apparently you need an IQ of 90 for a laptop for school, and she had an IQ of 89. I could not believe what I was hearing and that this was actually the case. I thought surely, we cannot be getting things like this so wrong. The mam, as the Minister of State can imagine, wanted to even buy the laptop for the school but was told it was not going to do her any good when the child gets to secondary school and that it had to come through the scheme. The school could see that the child needed the laptop as well. I had a look into the issue, and according to Circular 10/2013, funding is provided to schools towards the cost of computers and specialist equipment which are required for educational purposes. All equipment provided under the scheme supports children with more complex disabilities who, in order to access the school curriculum, require essential specialist equipment. To qualify for equipment under the assistive technology scheme, a student must have been diagnosed with a physical or communicative disability and must also have a recommendation in a professional assessment that the equipment is essential to allow the students to access the curriculum. We are ticking the boxes here so far. SENOs will review the application and professional reports provided in support of same, to establish whether the criteria of the scheme have been met. I assume this is were the IQ of 90 criterion comes in. The SENOs will then make a recommendation to the Department as to whether assistive technology is required. Based on this recommendation, the Department will decide on the level of grant, if any, to be provided. I took that from the Department. This says to the mother that her child has to be more clever than she is to get this equipment. Maybe her daughter might have scored 90 and not 89 if she did the test the next day. The mother is so frustrated about this. However, it turns out, after a bit of research, that a new assistive technology circular was due in the first quarter of this year. It has not come out yet. It will give the power to the school. The Department aims to shift the scheme from a diagnosis-based approach to a needs-based approach, which is music to many parents' ears, granting schools greater autonomy in determining whether a child requires assistive technology to access the curriculum. That seems like something we need to get done now. It is great that the Department has recognised this, done the work on it and can see that it is what needs to be done in schools. I am calling for this to happen now. Let us ease the pressure on parents and on this mam who cannot access a laptop for her daughter. I know the school is advocating for her. The circular was due in quarter 1. Can we please find out when this new circular is going to come out, in order that the schools can help all the children get their laptops to help them learn at school and be the same as all their classmates? --- Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted. Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-05-27/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:55:00+00:00 Sitting date: 2026-05-27