Schools for Specific Purposes were public schools for children with special needs that were set up by the New South Wales Department of Education. They operated within a number of state child welfare institutions. Their naming and classification has changed over time, but such schools are created where children require hospitalisation or have physical, intellectual or psychological disabilities. This definition appears to have applied where schools were attached to training schools, industrial schools, juvenile detention centres and juvenile justice centres, truancy schools, disability institutions and respite care facilities.