Niamh Smyth (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I wholeheartedly congratulate the Minister on the terrific announcement yesterday that 310 schools have been brought under the delivering equality of opportunity in schools, DEIS, programme. That €32 million investment will make a major difference to many thousands of students throughout the country.

As somebody who not only taught history of art but corrected it for the SEC, I am acutely aware that the marking scheme is very important for teachers in giving accurate advice to students on time spent on questions. In my experience, that was available to us in history of art at pre-examination level and for corrections. It is very important for teachers to have that guidance to enable them to give correct information to their students about how much time they should spend on questions. I again ask the Minister to examine this, especially for history and geography. We should not be precluded from saying teachers should be given that guidance. As I said, we had it for history of art and I do not see why it should not be the same for geography and history.

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