The Education Authority in Northern Ireland will start a public consultation on reforms to classroom support for children with special educational needs on March 24, 2026. The consultation will last eight weeks.

Tomas Adell, EA's Chief Transformation Officer, stated that the programme will unfold in phases with input from children, parents, carers, teachers, and school leaders. He added that the consultation will allow public input to shape the changes.

Reforms will give schools more flexibility to match support to each child's needs. Schools can shift from uniform one-to-one arrangements to options like small group sessions, varied teaching approaches, and added input from specialists.

New statements of special educational needs will target individual requirements. These statements will avoid strict rules on support types to allow school-level decisions.

Every child needing one-to-one support will keep it. Changes to current provisions will occur via annual reviews.

The first phase starts in September 2026. It covers 40 special schools and 150 mainstream schools with new statements. Rollout will continue across Northern Ireland in later years.

In June 2026, subject to consultation results, EA plans to release the final support model and updated guidance on assessments and statements.

EA published FAQs on the plans ahead of the consultation. No redundancies are expected among classroom assistants.