Pandemic triggers disability provisions in schools

“The pandemic has pushed them to the edge.’’ More students have being diagnosed with disabilities since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Principals say high anxiety has increased the number of students diagnosed with a social-emotion disability since the start of the pandemic.

Disability diagnoses among school students have soared during the pandemic, with nearly a quarter of all students now eligible for extra assistance in class.

As a royal commission resumes hearings in Canberra today about the education of children with disability, The Australian can reveal that one in every 15 Australian school students has a “social-emotional’’ disability, such as autism, anxiety or depression, official data reveals.

Twelve per cent have a cognitive disability, including Down syndrome and learning disorders like dyslexia and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).

Physical disability affects one in every 40 students, based on 2021 results from the Nationally Consistent Collection of Data on School Students with Disability.

In total, 22 per cent of students have a disability diagnosed by a health professional or teacher, placing strain on education budgets as governments funnel extra funding to schools that have enrolled students with disability.

More than 43,000 extra children were diagnosed with a disability in public schools across Australia between 2019 and 2021 – a 12 per cent increase since start of the pandemic.

The total number of students enrolled in state schools rose only 1 per cent over the two years.

The federal government is now paying schools extra money to teach nearly 400,000 public school students diagnosed with disabilities ranging from blindness and paraplegia to ADHD and dyslexia.

The alarming increase coincides with principals’ and psychologists’ warnings of a “shadow pandemic’’ of debilitating mental health problems, such as anxiety, depression and eating disorders, among children from the first years of school.

Australian Secondary Principals’ Association president Andrew Pierpont said more students were suffering from anxiety since the start of the pandemic.

“For lots of kids who were a bit marginal, especially around anxiety and depression, the pandemic has pushed them to the edge,’’ he said. “That’s probably contributing a lot to the numbers we’re seeing now.’’

Australian Education Union president Correna Haythorpe said teachers were reporting higher anxiety among students, shorter attention spans and more challenging classroom behaviours since the end of lockdowns.

She said the union’s latest State of Our Schools survey found 83 per cent of principals did not have enough resources to meet the needs of students with disability.

“Students with additional needs were neglected by the previous government, with almost nine in 10 public school principals reporting that they had to use funds from other budget areas to cover funding shortfalls for students with disability,’’ she said.

Funding is based on the level of disability, diagnosed by a doctor or psychologist.

The money is used to hire extra teaching staff or allied health professionals in schools, or to pay for equipment such as technology or separate learning spaces.

In Victoria, where many schools were closed for two years in the world’s longest lockdown, the number of public school students eligible for disability funding in 2019 soared 17.6 per cent to 97,223 last year.

The startling increase is revealed in Federal Education Department data provided to a senate estimates hearing.

The Royal Commission into Violence, Abuse, Neglect and Exploitation of People with a Disability will begin a week of public hearings on Monday to examine the experiences of children in “special schools’’ that educate 12 per cent of children with disabilities.