TEACHERS are struggling to cope with the roll-out of a policy that places more pupils with learning difficulties in mainstream schools, their main union has warned.
The Glasgow branch of the Educational Institute of Scotland (EIS) said recent moves by the city council to reduce the number of pupils sent to special schools was causing significant problems in primaries.
The scale of the shift is highlighted by figures that show there are 1646 pupils in specialist provision compared to 1726 in 2013 and 1972 in 2011.
Hugh Donnelly, secretary of the EIS branch in Glasgow, said a lack of staff to support pupils with additional support needs (ASN) was leading to greater levels of disruption as well as having an effect on the learning of others.
In particular, Mr Donnelly highlighted a decision by Glasgow City Council to disband a group of 24 teachers working with pupils who have pronounced support needs.
The council refuted the suggestions, arguing Glasgow was complying with national legislation on mainstreaming and that all pupils were well supported.
Glasgow has traditionally had more special schools than other councils and has therefore been slower to implement mainstreaming - an international strategy backed by the United Nations that promotes the right of every child to be educated in their local community.
As a result, Glasgow has recently opened a number of specialist support units for these pupils in primaries and secondaries.
The dispute comes in the week MSPs on the Scottish Parliament's education committee heard drastic cuts to budgets would create a lost generation of children with additional needs and put many support staff jobs at risk.
Changes in legislation and improved identification means these pupils account for nearly one-fifth in mainstream schools, but pupil-teacher ratios have fallen as this number has increased.
Mr Donnelly said: "The nature of the pupils and their behaviours means that even a small number can stretch the capacity of the school to cope and we are seeing a variety of issues from pupils not being toilet-trained to the more extreme end where children cannot cope with the classroom environment and respond with aggressive and violent behaviour."
The EIS intends to survey headteachers and senior managers across Glasgow to find out the scale of the issue and the impact on learning and teaching.
A spokeswoman for the council said Glasgow was committed to targeting the individual support needs of every child in the city and reviewing provision to meet these needs.
She said: "The number of children and young people in stand-alone specialist provision has reduced over the past 10 years as needs and demand change, but the number of specialist places overall has stayed broadly the same.
"In the past three years we have opened 11 new specialist provisions located in mainstream schools and one new secondary school at Westmuir High dedicated to meet the additional-support needs of secondary pupils. We will continue to review the changes and, in consultation with staff and parents, meet the demands of every individual child and young person in the city."
The spokeswoman said the team of specialists being disbanded would see all staff either retiring or being redeployed as classroom teachers.
"This was a valued service, but we feel going forward that this model did not provide value for money," she added.
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