Emer Currie (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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6. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills for an update on the survey of primary school parents and guardians and parents and guardians of children not yet in school on their preferences on important aspects of school provision and choice in their community, as committed to in the programme for Government. [59853/25]

Emer Currie (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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I am looking for an update on the survey for primary school parents and guardians on their preferences for school provision and choice in their community that was launched today. I thank the Minister for that. Will she include in her response what happens if a need is established through the survey? What impact will this have on secondary school choice? Will there be a follow-on survey for secondary schools? It does impact on my Dublin City Council part of Dublin West.

Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael)
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I was pleased to be in a position to officially launch the new online survey for our primary schools today. This essentially enables parents and guardians of children in primary school, and of those who will attend primary school, and the teachers, staff and boards of management in our primary schools, to take part in a survey. There were three very simple and straightforward questions in the survey: whether people want their school be single sex or co-educational; whether they want their child or children to be taught through the medium of English or Irish; and whether they want their school to have a denominational or multidenominational ethos or religious or non-religious patronage.

The whole objective of this survey is for the Department, for the first time, to get a clear understanding of what it is that parents want in education provision for their children. The curriculum is the same and is taught the same irrespective of what school they are in, but for all of the other areas I mentioned, we have not ever had a survey of this kind where we are surveying parents of over 800,000 young people. It is important we get that information.

To give some context, the number of young people in co-educational schools is at 90%. Only 10% are same-sex schools, so that question perhaps only applies to a smaller number of people. The number of young people in our schools who are being taught through the medium of Irish is at 8%, so 92% are being taught through the medium of English. Do we want to see a greater increase or level of provision for our Gaelscoileanna? That will, hopefully, support and complement the two new strategies I am launching later this week. In relation to patronage, 95% of our schools have a religious ethos. The majority are Catholic in ethos, others are Church of Ireland, there are a small number of other schools and 5% are multi-denominational. Do we have a desire and demand from parents to provide more diverse opportunities for different types of patronages?

It is very important that as many people as possible take this survey. I encourage, within the Deputy's constituency and others, parents and guardians to take this survey so we get a clearer picture. While there are not the same percentages for post-primary schools - it is about 50:50 at the moment on patronage between multidenominational and denominational - there is potentially an opportunity after this survey to see whether there is demand in certain areas, where there is maybe a more skewed percentage, to do something similar or to ask those questions of parents as well.

Emer Currie (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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I thank the Minister. I also thank her for launching the survey. It is an issue that impacts the Dublin City Council part of Dublin West at primary and secondary school level. The area is not served well enough in terms of access to or choice of secondary schools. Pelletstown has a Dublin 15 postcode but is not in the catchment area for Dublin 15 schools. People there live in the Cabra-Glasnevin electoral area but are in the Finglas school area. For our Dublin 7 neighbourhoods, only 40% of the children living in the area attend local schools because the geographical area is not prioritised enough in school admission policies. There simply is not enough choice, which is driving students further afield. We have two single-sex Catholic schools and a mixed non-denominational school, which is growing and growing well, but will not serve the needs of the whole community for some time. Local capacity is not serving local families.

What is the plan after the primary schools? How will this impact secondary schools? Will there be a follow-on survey for secondary schools?

Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael)
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While this survey is for secondary schools, this will last for six weeks and then we will need time to collate that information and decide based on the responses where there needs to be further engagement with communities if there is a demand for change. On the issue of patronage, there is not the same breakdown that we might see in primary schools. About 50% of our post-primary schools are denominational and about 50% are non-denominational. However, I accept that in certain areas that is not the case and there is not as much choice for parents. There is validity in looking beyond this survey and potentially looking at certain areas to survey or to engage parents and see if there is a demand for particular changes in those areas.

We are doing this survey in the way that we have done because previously any surveys that were done were done on a smaller scale and they did not work as effectively. We have to take that into consideration in any type of survey or any type of engagement with post-primary schools. Certainly it is something that we need to keep open. We need to engage with schools, parents and communities on the matter and I am very much open to that.

Emer Currie (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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I would also like to give a voice to those parents in terms of post-primary choice.

I take the opportunity to mention funding resources for special schools. I thank the Minister for the increase in the capitation grant in the budget. It is something that we had discussed at the education committee and I know it was on her agenda. I am always pushing for more resources. As I have mentioned previously, on the allowances for special schools, they may have 70 staff but the allowances for principals are based on how many teachers they have, whereas special school could have 70 staff made up of SNAs, escorts, cleaning staff and caretakers. They obviously then do not get those allowances. One of the suggestions coming from our principals is the introduction of an AP1 for special schools because that would help manage all the staffing. If such a school had 70 teachers, it would have a huge staffing team to manage that but special schools do not have that and they really need it.

Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael)
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I acknowledge the Deputy's absolute commitment to supporting our special schools and supporting children with additional needs. Working with the Minister of State, Deputy Moynihan, I was really pleased to have been able to secure additional funding in the budget. There was an anomaly there when students reached the age of 12 that they were not receiving the capitation funding that other students in mainstream schools were getting. It is important that was levelled and that anomaly was changed. The Minister of State and I are open to looking at further ways in which we can support our special schools and support the staff in the schools in particular.

Yesterday I was in Cara Community School, a new special school opened in my constituency with fantastic staff and teams there. We need to make sure that we are doing everything to support those teachers in what can often be a challenging but really rewarding and a really important school environment. I am very much open to looking at how we can support those working in the schools and whether there are changes or introductions of new posts or levels that we can provide that would take some of that pressure off and support those schools in different ways.