Jonathan O'Brien (Cork North Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Under the previous system, there was a very ad hoc approach to how schools were implementing those guidelines. Some schools had very good anti-bullying policies in place while others were not so good. The new circular sets out procedures to give direction and guidance to school authorities and personnel in preventing and tackling school-based bullying behaviour. I also note that we looked at the definition. In respect of the definition and how schools will implement the circular, I think the Minister has allocated €40,000 for training purposes for boards of management. When one breaks that down in terms of the number of schools and boards of management, we are looking at 72 courses. Is the Minister satisfied this will be enough to implement the circular? One of the things he asked for was for parents to become more involved in the development of the policy. Parents who sit on boards of management may not have expertise in developing that type of policy so they need that type of training. After the allocation of the figure of €40,000, are we looking at extending it and putting in place more training programmes? Will it be a continuous assessment with regard to how the policy is being developed and the review mechanisms put in place?

I looked at the templates, which are very good, but one of the options in a template allows schools to leave out some of the template produced by the Minister. I do not know if this is the right way to go because much of the information in the existing template is the type of information that needs to be recorded, and leaving out sections of the template should not be an option.

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