The shortage of special education institutions in the island is forcing scores of children identified with learning difficulties to be returned to regular schools, even while they are not ready to be placed back into the system.

Trevorlyn McGhan, the head of the Special Education Unit at the Mico Practising Primary and Junior High in Kingston, says while there are many success stories of children who are placed back into regular schools, the lack of institutions to which they can be referred once they have passed through her programme, is severe. Her unit runs a remedial programme for children suffering mostly from reading problems, but also children with intellectual deficiencies and behavioural problems. The programme, which is run by the Government, treats the child for two years. After two years, the child is reassessed and those who are believed to be able to cope are placed back into regular schools. The others are referred to special institutions.

"There are very few places where students can be referred and that is one of the disadvantages, because the two years is really short, and sometimes at the end of the two years, the children are just beginning to show that they are ready to learn," McGhan says.

"We are not able to keep them longer because the waiting list is very, very long," she adds. There are about 900 children who are waiting to go through the unit's programme.

She says the capacity of special institutions, such as Carberry Court, are very limited and so there is not enough space for all their referees. Hence, they end up back into primary schools.

Government has promised to help cement the cracks in the special education sector. Hixwell Douglas, special education spokesman at the Education Ministry, says the $5 billion education transformation pro-gramme is to put emphasis on the area. Through the project, more clinical psychologists are to be placed in these special institutions while the programme will also institute a "child find" mechanism, geared at identifying children with learning problems in the early stages. This will be complemented by the establishment of assessment centres in every region.

"We are also focusing in this transformation on ensuring that parent education becomes an integral part of the whole management of special education, and that the diagnostic prescriptive approach be used by teachers as they try to ensure that students get a one-on-one kind of interaction," he says.