East Clare Secondary School To Gain New Autism Class

0:00Absolutely, we're delighted with today's news. It's been long awaited. We've been fighting very hard for this now for a year at this point to try and get sanctioned for an additional class. We have in total already two special classes for students with autism. And their fabulous classes were full at capacity with them and they've been very, very successful. And in fact, we're one of the earliest schools in the country to open classes for students with autism. So there's a long standing tradition here in our school and we're delighted to be able to cater for the students in our locality. So the need for a third special class is really evident here and we've been looking for it for a long time. It was a slow coming around in the process, but today we got our news, which we've been waiting for. So it was absolutely thrilled to be able to contact the families of the students who are on a waitress to get into those classes, to get into that class. So it's a very good day all around here. And of course, the big comfort for many families is that they want to keep their children

1:00in the mainstream school. But obviously, yeah, have them in their space where they're going to be with students like them or they're going to be able to get, I suppose, the one-on-one support that they need and this really compromises that. Absolutely. Look, it's so important for these students that they're able to access the specialist support that they need, but they're also able to access the mainstream curriculum. And that's the great thing about these classes because you can, you know, you can provide for inclusion as well as providing for diversity all in one goal. And another thing also just to add is that it's very important for these families that their sons and daughters kind of tend the local school and that they don't have to be shipped off to a school far away just because there's no space in the local school. And that's, I suppose, what I've been advocating for for many months now that students who live very close and their friends from their class are going into our mainstream school, why would they not be able to attend our school as well? And that's something very, very passionate about. So finally,

2:02we got that over the line and I think it's really important for all of those reasons that those students kind of tend our school.