Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I want to acknowledge the huge amount of work by this committee on the whole area of senior cycle reform and the valuable additional resources provided to the Department. As I said, in September 2025, the first tranche of nine subjects will begin. Seven of those subjects are currently out for public consultation on the specifications of what is involved with them. That is open until 23 February. The two new subjects will also be going out for public consultation. It is important that everyone will be able to look at it and make suggestions and have a view on what works and where there are opportunities to do things differently. I hear what the Cathaoirleach is saying about it being concrete for the staff who are teaching it and for the students to understand it and that would be my view. Heretofore, there was a lot of emphasis on specifications and on learning outcomes and perhaps more detail is required on the nitty-gritty, granular material. I am very clear on that myself; I was there when other new innovations came in to schools. It is very much the focus of the Department. Very substantial information will be provided to staff.

Significant CPD will be provided in advance to the staff. Our timeline is that it will begin in September 2025 in the schools but the training up of staff will take place in 2024 up to June 2025. I invite people, given that the first seven subjects are open up to 23 February, to take the opportunity to look at it and to see what their thoughts are. I acknowledge that we have had great engagement from the subject areas and the bodies which represent the various subjects and all of that. It is worthwhile to go online to see what is there. We will conclude that public consultation then with a view to moving everything along.

It also is important to say that we are in a position now to be able to announce an acceleration., which is very positive. Sometimes when we talk about reform and doing things differently, people feel it is so distant from them and that they never experience it. It is important to say that students who are currently in the system will be the first cohort within the senior cycle when they go into fifth year in September 2025.

The Chair also asked me about the additional components. The additional components are 40%. It is the plan that the specifications for that will go out to the schools very early and well in advance. If they are completing them in one year, these will go out the previous year and those specifications will be clear as to what is being done. Again, that additional component, or a new type of opportunity for students to show their skills, is an important and integral part of senior cycle.