Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)

The Department accepts they are disadvantaged which is the reason they have secured such high teacher-pupil ratios. Our objective is to encourage participation in the education system. The pupil-teacher ratio in one of the schools referred to is 6.9 to one. In light of the requests received, the Department asked the schools to submit details of individual cases. These have not yet been received but as soon as information is supplied by the individual schools on the children Deputy Gregory stated have joined the schools and need assistance, the schools will receive additional allocations if it is found they have children with low incidence, as is the case with other schools all over the country.

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