Students with disabilities are being babysat at school rather than being given the resources and time they need to learn, Western Australia’s Primary Principals’ Association says.
President Stephen Breen said a leaked report by PricewaterhouseCoopers showed the average number of students with a learning disability was 18.6 per cent, but only 5 per cent received funding.
Because of the lack of resources… you have an instance where a lot of children are being babysat, which is a real pity.
Mr Breen said not enough was being done for students with disabilities.
“These children do need expert guidance and expert teaching and expert care,” he said.
“This means that schools and teachers are receiving 5 per cent of resources for the children, but in fact there’s something like another two thirds that do need resources to actually…maximise their learning,” he said.
“Because of the lack of resources, and here we’re talking about teacher time, we’re talking about education support time and professional learning time…you have an instance where a lot of children are being babysat, which is a real pity.
“What we really need to do is maximise their learning.”
The federal and state ministers for education have been contacted for comment.
Mr Breen said more funding was needed.
“If you’re going to have an inclusion policy, you have to actually fund it,” he said.
“If you don’t, it puts enormous pressure on other students, it puts enormous pressure on teachers, enormous pressure on supporting staff and for the individual student who has a disability – a massive pressure.”
He was keen to see a more level playing field.
“It’s a huge worry, we would call upon the Federal Government to act immediately on this so that we can have all of our students, and I mean disability students and non-disability students, all on a level playing field,” Mr Breen said.
He said schools were compensating for the lack of funding for students with disabilities by diverting money from other areas such as computing or physical education.
“What we’re having at the moment is that schools are robbing Peter to pay Paul,” he said.
“What they’re doing is they’re using some of the funding that they have for other areas to make sure the children of disabilities receive a good education.”
read the full story... (off-site)- Topics:
- Education
- Author:
- Bonnie Christian
- Source:
- ABC News
- Date published:
- Tue 4th Nov, 2014