Jan O'Sullivan (Limerick City, Labour) | Oireachtas source

The primary online database was rolled out across the primary school system during the 2014 to 2015 academic year. The primary online database, POD, will allow the Department to more closely monitor and evaluate progress and outcomes of pupils at primary level, to validate school enrolment returns for grant payment and teacher allocation purposes, and to follow up on pupils who do not make the transfer from primary to post-primary level.

A revised fair processing notice was issued in April 2015. The fair processing notice outlines the legal basis under which schools can ask parents or guardians for information and share it with the Department of Education and Skills. The fair processing notice is available on my Department's website.

The vast majority of schools have now entered their pupil data on the POD. The POD will become the basis for grant payments and teacher allocations from 2016 to 2017 onwards. The primary school annual census return will continue to be the basis for grant payments and teacher allocations for 2015 to 2016. A mechanism has been put in place already to allow for schools to create non-identifiable records for currently enrolled pupils whose parents object strongly to providing data for the POD. This means that those pupils will continue to be counted for teacher allocation and grant payment purposes.

Throughout the process consultations have been held with the education stakeholders, including the National Parents Council Primary. The feedback from schools and parents has been very positive since the reissuing of the POD fair processing notice and the issuing of Circular 0025/2015 which provided further practical information to schools about the POD.

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