Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)

The teachers will be allocated this year under a new allocation process recognising the number of students in those schools. An assessment kit — one can call it what one likes — is a method of assessment and a way in which teachers will be able to ascertain the language competency of a child. That is being devised in conjunction with Integrate Ireland Language and Training Limited. That group has also provided the teacher training about which the Deputy spoke. It has held seminars for language support teachers — part-time and whole-time — has provided classroom materials and has included the European language portfolio which provides grants for teachers for language tuition for refugees etc. Integrate Ireland Language and Training Limited is the expert in this area. That is why we called it in and are working with it to provide the training and the assessment kits. The allocations will be based on that.

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