Ms Kate Waterhouse:

I thank the Deputy. We have feedback from the ten new HSCLs. DEIS has gathered data from them. They are supported through training and through sharing of good practice with the HSCLs and other teams members in STAR. We have a STAR co-ordinator who is funded from the Dormant Accounts Fund and who works to make sure good practice is shared between our ten new HSCLs and the STAR teams. I will go through some of the feedback to let members know what it has been regarding those ten HSCLs and what they have felt the impact has been. Obviously, as they are in schools that are not supported through the DEIS programme, it is the first time those schools have had a HSCL co-ordinator within the school. The HSCLs have found that they have had an impact on the school culture in creating a more reflective process such as in some cases the school thinking about how it is meeting the needs of all its students. In some cases, they have been able to create a time and budget to engage much more with the parents. As that is a large amount of feedback from all HSCLs, as well as HSCLs in the STAR programme, there is a huge amount of engagement and support of parents and Traveller and Roma parents. I will go into that a little bit more.

Another piece is in creating positive relationships with families, increasing the engagement of those families and parents with the education system and improving the parents' experience of education. In many cases, those parents may have had negative experiences and having this positive engagement and relationship built on trust and respect improves the whole engagement with the education system. What the HSCLs have found is that there is a complex intergenerational experience there which they work to try to address in partnership and in conjunction with families and parents. A lot of the time of the HSCLs and much of the impact happens in the course of home visitation and that is part of building those positive relationships, as well as trust and mutual respect.

They also have noted that in a lot of cases, there are many complex needs that go beyond education. A lot of work happens by engaging with other community supports and other services that are available to support those other more complex needs. A lot of work also goes into relationships with community and other organisations, including Traveller and Roma organisations. A lot of worthwhile time is spent in this regard, as a lot of support comes from those other organisations as well.

Obviously, a huge amount of work goes into attendance, especially post Covid. Regarding retention and participation in school, the HSCL co-ordinators have found that attendance is the first and most important step to address. A lot of time is being spent on that at individual level and at broader levels with things like attendance drives, and again, the parental partnerships. For example, in 2022 and 2023, 252 parents attended events organised by HSCLs in those schools and many of those had a focus on literacy and numeracy and supporting parents in that sense. They also encouraged a large number of parents in those schools to participate in parents' councils. Overall, what came across from the feedback was that they were really bridging a gap between families and the schools. That is what we have heard from the ten HSCL co-ordinators.