A consultation document on special education has been released in the latest stage in a review of the service.Associate Education Minister Heather Roy said the Government wanted people's views on how best to help students with special needs.Questions in t
A consultation document on special education has been released in the latest stage in a review of the service.
Associate Education Minister Heather Roy said the Government wanted people's views on how best to help students with special needs.
Questions in the review included:
* How could schools work together?
* What arrangements should there be for funding, decision-making, verification and fund-holding? And
* What constituted success and how should it be measured?
In speech notes for the launch, Mrs Roy said there had been many positive changes to special education services, but not all were happy with it.
The discussion document said the Government spent around $450 million on special education and those commenting on the review had to work under the presumption that there would be no new money beyond the $18 million a year announced in last year's budget.
The document included a wide range of options for reorganisation of the services, though Mrs Roy said she was committed to parents having choice to where children with special needs went.
One option was to close all special schools and use those resources through all schools, though this would remove the choice of sending a child to a special school.
Another option would be to keep the current special schools open but solely as support for regular schools and not have any enrolled children.
At the other end of the scale an option was to allow any family with a child they considered had special needs to send them to a special school without needing the permission of the Education Ministry.
Submissions on the document close in March.
