Additional Needs: Pupil to Teacher Ratio Worst Ever
Scottish Greens Education Spokesperson Ross Greer MSP has today revealed figures showing that the number of additional support needs teachers has plummeted by 400 since 2010.
This alarming statistic comes at a time when the number of pupils identified as having an additional support need has rocketed by over 130,000 during the period.
When looked at alongside the recently published pupil census these figures reveal that for every 58 ASN pupils there is just one specialist teacher, an increase from one to fifty five in 2017 and one teacher to every 18 pupils in 2010.
Ross Greer MSP said:
"Far too many children in Scotland with additional support needs are being failed. To have just one ASN specialist teacher for every fifty eight young people with diagnosed additional needs, never mind the thousands more whose needs are not diagnosed yet, is just unacceptable. It fails not just the children with additional needs but every other child in the class, not to mention the classroom teachers who don't have the additional staff they desperately need.
“The Scottish Greens have put local council funding first in budget negotiations these last three years, and we're proud that we’ve delivered the extra resources and reforms councils desperately need. It’s a long road back to where we were before 2010 though. Nearly a decade of budget cuts need undone and until that happens Greens will keep fighting for the funds councils need to deliver essential services for everyone in our communities."