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THE SCHOOL SECTOR: LINGUISTIC ACCESS TO EDUCATION FOR DEAF PUPILS

5. THE NUMBER OF DEAF PUPILS

5.1. SCOTTISH GOVERNMENT STATISTICS

The Scottish Government's ScotXed programme supports the collection of statistical information about numbers of deaf children in school education via the annual school census. The definition of the population included has changed in recent years, in response to policy and legislative developments. Up to and including 2001/2002, the population included only those who had a Record of Needs ( RoN) and for whom the 'main difficulty' was deafness. In 2002/2003 the group was widened to encompass those who did not have RoNs, but who did have an Individualised Education Plan ( IEP), again for whom the 'main difficulty' was deafness. In 2004, the Additional Support for Learning Act (Scotland, 2004) changed the framework within which numbers of deaf children are reported, replacing the concept of 'special educational needs' with that of 'additional support needs', and broadening the population to include all deaf pupils with specified records, whether or not deafness is their 'main difficulty'.

The Scottish Government and Learning and Teaching Scotland provide guidance on eligibility for IEPs. However, local authorities have created a variety of systems for recording additional support needs, and it is likely that this creates regional variations. For example, staged intervention systems can vary from three to five stages among authorities. Also, some are able to moderate the implementation of their particular staged systems across schools and some have not yet got moderation systems in place. In the latter cases, it is possible that there will be variations in eligibility for IEPs at individual school level. Further study will be helpful in identifying how far there are inconsistencies at both school and regional levels. National networks of Additional Support for Learning Officers and Educational Psychologists would provide useful sources of information.

In November 2005, within the new ASL framework, RoNs started to be phased out and new 'Co-ordinated Support Plans ( CSPs)' were introduced. The School Census statistics reflect this transition period for the first time in 2006. Also, until RoNs are phased out, figures will show both RoNs and and CSPs, in addition to IEPs.

These changes are likely to largely explain the significant variations in the numbers reported annually since 2000, as shown in Table 1.

5.2. ADPS STATISTICS

Section 11 provides basic information on the ADPS project, which collected statistics on deaf pupils between 2000 and 2005. The deaf pupil population was defined by the level of service received, in recognition of the fact that mild and unilateral hearing losses can sometime impact on learning (Most, 2004) and that conventional descriptors can be sometimes misleading (Brett, 2003). The target population (known as 'Group A') included all pupils who either attended a school for deaf pupils or a mainstream school with a unit for deaf pupils, or were visited by a teacher of deaf children twice a year or more.

Table 4 shows that the ADPS population was consistently higher than that identified by the, then, Scottish Executive, during 2000/2004. Even when pupils with mild and unilateral hearing loss are excluded from the ADPS data, there was still a significant gap.

Table 4 Numbers of deaf pupils in Scotland, 2000/2007

* Figures from Scottish Government statistical publications: http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Statistics/Browse/School-Education
** There can be more than one reason for support
*** In year 4, a lower return rate and complexities over tracking pupil migrations may have caused a slight under-reporting affect

5.3. PRESENTING STATISTICS ON THE POPULATION OF DEAF CHILDREN

The variations and caveats detailed above suggest a need for care in contextualising available statistics about the number of deaf children in Scotland.

It may be that additional sources of data could be exploited: for example, statistical information from paediatric audiology clinics. It was not possible to explore this within the limits of this study, but is something to consider in future.

5.4. STATISTICS RELATING TO EDUCATIONAL ATTAINMENT

Deaf pupils perform similarly to hearing pupils in non-verbal performance intelligence tests (Marschark, 2006). However, deaf pupils have persistently under-attained educationally compared to their hearing peers (Powers et al, 1998). The situation was recently demonstrated by ADPS to be no different in Scotland ( ADPS, 2006).

As there is a symbiotic relationship between language and cognition, it is reasonable to assume that good linguistic access will enable deaf pupils' achievement levels to converge with those of hearing pupils. ScotXed specifications, planned as far as 2008 (ScotXed, 2007), show that a limited number of data fields will enable exploration of factors relating to linguistic access: existence of hearing impairment; types of placement (special school, unit or mainstream); existence of 'communication adaptation'; 'sign language' as an option within 'home and additional languages'. There are no plans to include specialist subset information, such as: hearing loss levels, specific language approaches or specialist access arrangements. By contrast, since 2005, there have been a small range of linguistic access options within the field of Gaelic education, which enable exploration of extent of curricular access via Gaelic.

A large amount of ADPS data remains unexplored (see section 11 for details); funding is being sought to analyse these unexplored areas. Since this data was collected, there have been no published data on achievements of Scottish deaf pupils (a fact recently highlighted within a members' debate in the Scottish Parliament [Scottish Parliament, 2007]). As with the Pupil Level Annual School Census ( PLASC) in England, it is possible for researchers to apply to access attainment data relating to Scottish pupils identified by ScotXed as hearing impaired (for details of the procedure for requesting access, see Scottish Government, 2007a).

However, neither ScotXed nor PLASC support the collection of specialised data which would to enable exploration of a key range of influencing factors, such as hearing loss level etc. The nature of the systems also preclude the possibility of responding quickly to changes in specialist developments, such as rapidly changing advances in technology and advances in linguistic assessments of both BSL and English etc; it takes at least 18 months for any agreed changes to be adopted.

It had previously been hoped that ADPS would, with new funding, be able to collaborate with ScotXed by sharing relevant ScotXed data and by supplementing this with in-depth, specialist information collected through the ADPS annual survey. This would have enabled the definition of a country's population of deaf children and detailed tracking of factors influencing attainment, over time.

In England, a consortium of organisations and Universities is currently exploring the possibility of establishing just such an arrangement throughout the UK. The group includes representatives from the National Deaf Children's Society ( NDCS), the British Association of Teachers of the Deaf ( BATOD), Birmingham University and University College London. A pilot project is underway in one English area, and the group hope to raise funds to begin implementing across the UK within the next year. The group are aware that a way will need to be found to ensure that the complexities of the distinctive features of the Scottish system (as well as, to a lesser extent, Wales and Northern Ireland) are fully considered and addressed.

5.5. RECOMMENDATIONS

• There is a need for detailed knowledge of the population of deaf pupils, in order to track the impact of relevant developments in policy, legislation, technology and linguistics. A project similar to ADPS could collaborate with ScotXed to share and complement data. It is essential that there is Scottish representation on the consortium which is currently planning UK-wide data collection.
• Consideration could be given to exploiting data on numbers of deaf children and young people held by audiology departments across Scotland.
• Consistency is needed in the criteria for opening deaf pupil IEPS among individual schools and local authorities. Investigation of the current picture across the country would be helpful. National networks of Additional Support for Learning Officers and of Educational Psychologists could be usefully exploited in such a study.
• Caution is needed in referring to currently available statistics on deaf pupils; there is a need to clearly state the definition of the group quoted.

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