Funding for 768 additional special education teachers and 1,600 more special needs assistants has been provided as part of Budget 2025.
The Government announced a capital allocation of €1.3 billion for education.
It said this will support 350 building projects currently underway, as well as a further 200 new school projects.
There will also be increased funding for the School Transport Scheme.
In his Budget speech, Minister for Public Expenditure Paschal Donohoe announced that the Free Schoolbooks initiative will be extended to all transition and senior cycle pupils in post-primary schools within the free education scheme.
Minister Donohoe said supports as part of the 'Keeping Childhood Smartphone Free' initiative will be rolled out next year.
"This policy will support the wellbeing of our children and provide them with the best possible environment for learning," he said.
Minister Donohoe also said the National Training Fund is in surplus due to the growth in numbers at work and increased employers' PRSI receipts.
Budget 2025 will introduce an almost €1.5bn package over a six-year period up to 2030 to better fund research, further and higher education, skills and development and decarbonisation.
The minister said this will include an increase in core funding to Higher Education by €150m a year with the main focus of this on meeting the funding requirements of universities.
The funding will include support for additional healthcare and veterinary places under the expressions of interest expansion programme and an increase in certain PhD stipends.
Funding for further education will support the continued growth of the craft apprenticeship system to 6,800 apprentice registrations in 2025 and skills requirements in micro, small and medium enterprises to build business for the future, as well as upskilling for the community, voluntary and social enterprise sector.
Education and Training Boards Ireland welcomed a number of announcements in the budget, including the once-off reduction of 33% in the contribution fee for apprentices in higher education.
General Secretary of the ETBI Paddy Lavelle said this was "very welcome".
Mr Lavelle said that the extension of the free book scheme up to Leaving Certificate students was "very important" and the extension of the hot school meals for all primary students next year was "going to make a big difference".
Of the capital allocation to support existing and new school building projects and further education and training building projects, Mr Lavelle said: "That's going to make a big difference to the parity of esteem within further education and training, and that's something we have really pushed for."
'Missed opportunity for education'
The Irish National Teachers' Union said the budget "failed to address the urgent needs of primary and special schools".
INTO General Secretary John Boyle said it appeared that the Government was prioritising the roll-out of the Keeping Childhood Smartphone Free" programme over the more pressing needs of schools and their teachers and students.
"Providing a higher allocation for mobile phone pouches than the increase in primary capitation is tone deaf to the pressing needs of primary and special schools. At a time when Ireland has the largest budget surplus in the history of the State, it beggars belief that initiatives like this have been prioritised over the real needs of our cash-strapped schools," Mr Boyle said.
Mr Boyle said that the union, which represents primary school teachers, will be seeking clarity on measures announced for special education, school buildings, school transport, leadership, support for the primary curriculum framework, school meals and social inclusion programmes at tomorrow's budget briefing by Minister for Education Norma Foley.
The Teachers' Union of Ireland described Budget 2025 as "yet another missed opportunity for education".
TUI President David Waters said that the Government was "skirting around the edges, they are not tackling the fundamental in schools", adding that "the recruitment and retention crisis seems to have been ignored".
"We await full detail on the Budget 2025 education measures, but it is already clear that they will not remedy the damage that underinvestment and unrestored cutbacks have caused to the education system," Mr Waters said.
"There doesn't seem to be any increase in (teaching) allocation (to schools) which means unfortunately students will go into school next year and there will have been subjects that have been dropped, that's the reality," he said.
"They (the Government) are not addressing the core issues, whether it is offering incremental credit, which is recognising a teacher's experience from abroad to attract teachers from Dubai or these places, or whether it's increasing the (teaching) allocation to allow schools have the flexibility to offer full time jobs because currently only a third of teachers start on full time hours," Mr Waters said.
Mr Waters said that while the union "broadly welcomed" the extension of the free schoolbooks initiative at Senior Cycle, he said this needed to be resourced properly.
"This is going to be a huge administrative burden on schools and they can't just be left to find a way to get through it," Mr Waters said.
Of the extension of the Keeping Childhood Smartphone Free programme he said that there were "far bigger issues".
However he said he would expect that schools that have already invested in such mobile phone pouches to deter their use in schools would now be reimbursed.
Mr Waters welcomed the increase in core funding to higher education as "a step in the right direction" but added that it was "still a long, long way off the investment that is required to address the sector’s chronic funding crisis".
