Heather Humphreys (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

We fund the arts in education charter. We increased the funding last year. I am very committed to it. It relates to young children accessing the arts and getting the opportunity to get involved in them at an early age. It is about doing this in schools. Targeting schools is the best opportunity to access all of the children, including children in disadvantaged areas. We need to get into all the schools. This is the best way to get young people involved in the arts.

In 2015, support from my Department totalled €129,000 for the arts in education. This included a payment of €60,000 to the National Association of Principals and Deputy Principals for its work in arts in education. The Arts Council provides funding to a number of organisations to assist in the delivery of arts in education projects in schools. To be fair to the Arts Council, it does a lot of work in this area and provides support to Poetry Ireland's Writers in Schools scheme, which involves writers and storytellers visiting primary and post-primary schools. This is in addition to the Bringing to Book Artist-in-Residence scheme, which is a Children's Books Ireland project.

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