Mr. Martin Hanevy:

I thank the Chairman. As she has pointed out, the draft general scheme of the Bill was submitted to the joint committee for its consideration. This followed from an earlier public consultation process held in 2011. In forwarding the general scheme the Minister also provided draft regulations on the content of admission policies and the proposed admission process. While it is not generally the case that draft regulations are provided alongside the general scheme of a Bill, the Minister was anxious to do so in this matter, which clearly was of public interest, to facilitate a comprehensive discussion on the full range of measures to be provided either in the Bill or regulations. The draft framework proposes a new more parent-friendly, equitable and consistent approach to how school enrolment policy should operate in primary and post-primary schools. Its purpose is to improve access to schools for all pupils and ensure there is consistency, fairness and transparency in the admission policies of all schools and the service they provide for parents. The framework constitutes a significant public service reform aimed at substantially improving the experience between the public and schools in respect of student admission. Transforming public services and ensuring the citizen is at the heart of how public services operate is an important objective of the Government.

The Department acknowledges that schools will have some concerns about how the enrolment framework will affect them individually. The draft framework seeks to strike an appropriate balance between school autonomy, on the one hand, and the interests of parents in the education system, on the other. The Department desires the enrolment process to continue to transact at local school level with a high level of local discretion but within a framework that ensures fairness, transparency and good standards. Under this framework, external intervention in enrolment will be very much a last resort and will be confined to those most serious cases in which a school does not operate its enrolment in the fair, consistent and transparent manner set out in the draft framework.

For the reported 80% of schools that enrol all pupils, that is, that do not have an oversubscription problem, the impact of the framework will be relatively marginal. For the remaining 20% of schools that are oversubscribed, the framework specifies a small number of oversubscription criteria that will not be permissible. Otherwise, schools have discretion in how they prioritise applicants for enrolment, provided also that it is lawful from an equality perspective.

From the perspective of the parent, the framework makes clear that the enrolment policy will be available to all parents and will be explicit in affirming that the school will not discriminate on grounds of disability, special needs, sexual orientation, family status, membership of the Traveller community, race or civil status. Second, there will be a common national earliest date for the commencement of enrolment across the school system and, third, subject to limited exceptions, the default position will be that if a school has capacity, it must enrol all applicants. Other than recognised fee-charging schools, parents will not be charged any booking deposits, fees or other payments as a condition of initial enrolment or for continued enrolment. Parents will see in advance from the enrolment policy the oversubscription criteria the school will use if demand exceeds supply. Schools will have discretion on what oversubscription criteria they use, provided they are not one of the listed criteria that are not permissible. In the case of a school that was oversubscribed in the previous year or which expects to be in the coming year, parents will be able to see from the information provided by the school which categories of applicants were successful in the previous year’s enrolment process. This will be a useful and early indicator to the parent on the chances of being allocated a school place. If an applicant is unsuccessful in getting a school place, then the parent will be given the reasons the applicant failed to meet the enrolment criteria and this transparency should bring clarity for a parent and help to reduce appeals. An unsuccessful applicant will have access to a local appeal process to the board of management, which will be provided for in regulations. This proposal to have a strengthened local appeal process recognises the limitations of the current section 29 appeal process.

The vast majority of schools can and do enrol all applicants. However, where demand exceeds supply for a school, it is inevitable that some applicants will not be able to access their school of choice. Access to school of choice in such circumstances comes down simply to supply and demand. The experience is that in situations where demand exceeds supply, section 29 appeals are generally futile, as the school refused enrolment simply because it did not have enough places. The section 29 process has a significant flaw, as it makes no distinction between not getting enrolled in a school of choice and not getting enrolled in any school in the area in question. This framework takes enrolment out of the section 29 appeals process and proposes alternative remedies.

Under the new framework, an unsuccessful applicant must be given clear reasons as to the reason the applicant is not being allocated a school place. If the unsuccessful applicant considers that his or her application was incorrectly decided upon under the oversubscription criteria the school must publish, then an appeal may be made to the board of management. Essentially, such an appeal will boil down to whether the school correctly assessed the application under the oversubscription criteria. It is not a forum to submit new information and will not require any oral hearings.