Sixty-two children who had been waiting for special needs assessments in the public education system since 2020, and 30 plus children waiting to get into a school that can handle special needs, finally have the assistance they need, Acting Director of Education Dominique McCartney-Russell said yesterday. 

The Ministry of Education recently hired 22 special education teachers - something education officials called exciting and described as game changing for the public education system.

Fourteen additional teachers are near completion of the Master's Degree Programme in Special Education with Barry University as a result of a memorandum of understanding between the ministry and that university, according to officials.

"[At Government High School] we are going to have for the first time in many years a Special Education Unit cater to students with mild, moderate and severe intellectual deficiencies; and so, it means that you can pull those children out of the general population and give them targeted, personalized, individual educational support," she said.

"Our principals, our administrators and teachers, they have been crying for that. ... You will provide support for those children, but you will also provide empathy on behalf of the children in the general population and teachers. And so, it is the best environment for students with mild and moderate issues. They will be able to socialize in the general population but be given [that] support."

The teachers aren't just being provided for schools in New Providence, Russell noted.

She said special education teachers have been posted on Family Islands.

"So, a lot of schools now have special education units and pullout programs for those children," she said.

At a Ministry of Education press conference yesterday, Minister of Education Glenys Hanna-Martin said during the pandemic, special needs students were "off the radar".

"There was no virtual learning for most of them," she said.

"So they were just in the deep blue sea. So, we've decided we're going to bring them into the net of our human existence and cause for them to be able to access education."

She noted that without assessment, the 62 students could not get remediation.

"And so, hiring the speech pathologist, the school psychologist, allows us to assess those children quicker so we could provide remediation," she said.

"From 2020, 62 children not assessed, waiting on assessments. Some parents were waiting so long they went with private organizations, and of course, it's very costly. And so, you will find, too, we also had a wait list of, I think, 30 something children waiting to get into a school, and they no longer have to wait. So, it's pretty exciting to be able to offer that for our children, and I know one thing, our educators are pleased."

She stressed, "We have to be inclusive. We have to ensure that every Bahamian child gets access to a quality education, every child, regardless of socioeconomic or learning deficiencies etc."

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