OTs in Schools - NSW

Published: 9 September 2024

Back in February OTA provided a submission to inform the NSW Legislative Council's 'Inquiry into children and young people with disability in New South Wales educational settings' urging Government to fund the direct employment of allied health professionals, such as OTs, within the NSW Department of Education and establish well-resourced multidisciplinary teams at the regional level. The Committee conducting the review have now released their final report, which included OTA’s call to action, and the case study we provided. The report included 28 recommendations, including: 

• Recommendation 16 – which calls for the NSW Government to invest in specialist and allied health workforces to support children and young people with disability;  

• Recommendation 22 – which calls for the NSW Government to provide support to the Department of Education and schools to ensure they work with parents and NDIS providers to enhance and facilitate student access to NDIS-funded support in the school setting in order to achieve maximum benefits for the student and enhance teacher capability to address student needs. 

Members can access the full report here. We expect the NSW Government’s response to the report to be provided in late November.

OTA will be following this issue and updating members via OT Today.