Around 6,000 special needs assistants represented by the IMPACT trade union have voted by 95% to take industrial action over reductions in working hours and income.
IMPACT says that in some cases, individual posts are being fragmented into as few as ten hours a week.
It says this makes it impossible for SNAs to make any kind of living from their work, and with negative consequences for children relying on the service.
The union says this practice is a breach of the Haddington Road Agreement.
IMPACT Assistant General Secretary Dessie Robinson, said the Department of Education and Skills had pointed the finger of blame at the National Council for Special Education, which oversees the annual allocation of the SNA service.
The union is seeking a firm commitment from the department that no SNA will have their working hours or income reduced once there is work available in the school, as determined by the NCSE allocation, before any new member of staff is recruited for the school.
The union says that by breaking down posts, and hiring more SNAs instead of allocating work to those already to those SNAs already employed, the service was being compromised, and workers were being denied the chance to make a living.
IMPACT Deputy General Secretary Kevin Callinan said that the union had highlighted these developments last year when 365 new posts were announced in the budget.
He said he hoped the additional posts would contribute to reversing the harmful work pattern that was emerging.
IMPACT's Educational divisional executive will meet on 8 April to discuss the ballot outcome.
