Additional Support Needs in Scotland

That the Parliament acknowledges that, in Scotland, additional support needs (ASN) is a term used to describe the requirements for an estimated 190,000 children and young people, or 26.6% of all school pupils, who require extra help to reach their full learning potential; believes that ASN can include having motor or sensory impairments, learning difficulties such as dyslexia, English as an additional language or a myriad of emotional and social difficulties; notes that all schools have a duty to provide appropriate support and that this requirement was laid out in the Education (Additional Support for Learning) Scotland Act 2004; further notes that the Additional Support for Learning: Statutory Guidance 2017 sets out that schools have a number of responsibilities to support pupils who have ASN, such as making adequate and efficient provision for the support required, publishing, reviewing and updating specified information about their ASN policy, providing the parents of the pupils with all of the information that they are required to publish, providing, where needed, co-ordinated support plans for the pupils, and keeping this under regular review, and providing independent and free mediation services for parents and pupils, including publishing information about these services; believes that, with the right resources and focus, schools and further education settings, including those in Stirling and Clackmannanshire, can create a whole-school environment with an emphasis on inclusion and cooperation and delivering high aspirations; further believes that social and emotional skills programmes, which aim to build resilience through learning or coordinated support plans, can build skills step by step to bring success and give pupils with ASN a chance to test their skills out and receive encouragement and feedback, developing inclusiveness that can be encouraged through good quality health and wellbeing lessons, promoting relationships and diversity, supporting pupils to feel accepted and to belong; believes that, in addition to myriad other ambitions, they can help to deal with, and reduce, bullying and discrimination, and notes the calls that, in order for all pupils with ASN to benefit in full from their education, the support that they receive should be tailored to meet their individual needs and build on their strengths to help them overcome any difficulties that they experience.