Results 13,621-13,640 of 19,621 for speaker:Norma Foley

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: School Patronage (12 Oct 2021)

Norma Foley: I propose to take Questions Nos. 302, 303 and 304 together. New schools are established by my Department on the basis of identified demographic demand in an area, and only after consideration of the capacity of existing schools to absorb the expected school place demand. As set out for the Deputy previously, in order to plan for school provision and analyse the relevant demographic data, my...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: Departmental Contracts (12 Oct 2021)

Norma Foley: The details regarding procurements that took place by way of negotiated procedure without prior publication in 2020 and 2021 for my Department are listed in tabular form in the attached table. Eleven contracts with a total value of €3,990,113 were placed in 2020 and twelve contracts were placed or continued (from 2020) in 2021 with an aggregated spend to date of €5,880,646. ...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: School Transport (12 Oct 2021)

Norma Foley: The School Transport Scheme is a significant operation managed by Bus Éireann on behalf of the Department. In the 2020/2021 school year over 114,100 children, including over 14,700 children with special educational needs, were transported on a daily basis to primary and post-primary schools throughout the country at a cost of over €224.7m in 2020. The purpose of my Department's...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: Schools Refurbishment (12 Oct 2021)

Norma Foley: I wish to advise the Deputy that my Department has approved funding to the patron of the school in question to undertake refurbishment works in the property to facilitate the school's access to additional specialist accommodation for the current school year. This accommodation includes science, woodwork and home economics rooms. The delivery of the project has been devolved to the patron for...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: Departmental Administrative Arrangements (12 Oct 2021)

Norma Foley: I wish to advise the Deputy that the extended Summer Education Programme, which was in place until 2020, and which was often referred to as the July Provision programme, initially provided for pupils who had Autism, or who had severe and profound learning difficulties. Since the summer of 2020, and again in 2021, the Department has made provision for a significantly expanded summer education...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: School Transport (12 Oct 2021)

Norma Foley: The School Transport Scheme is a significant operation managed by Bus Éireann on behalf of the Department. In the 2020/2021 school year over 114,100 children, including over 14,700 children with special educational needs, were transported on a daily basis to primary and post-primary schools throughout the country at a cost of over €224.7m in 2020. The purpose of the...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: School Transport (7 Oct 2021)

Norma Foley: The School Transport Scheme is a significant operation managed by Bus Éireann on behalf of the Department. In the 2020/2021 school year over 114,100 children, including over 14,700 children with special educational needs, were transported on a daily basis to primary and post-primary schools throughout the country at a cost of over €224.7m in 2020. The purpose of my...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: School Facilities (7 Oct 2021)

Norma Foley: The major building project for the school referred to by the Deputy is currently at Stage 1 of Architectural Planning, which entails preliminary site and design options. The Design Team has been instructed to provide an initial sketch scheme for a 1,300 pupil new build school, and to submit their proposals to the Department for review. Officials from the Professional and Technical Section...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: School Transport (7 Oct 2021)

Norma Foley: The School Transport Scheme is a significant operation managed by Bus Éireann on behalf of the Department. In the 2020/2021 school year over 114,100 children, including over 14,700 children with special educational needs, were transported on a daily basis to primary and post-primary schools throughout the country at a cost of over €224.7m in 2020. The purpose of my...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: School Funding (7 Oct 2021)

Norma Foley: I can confirm to the Deputy, that my Department is in receipt of an application for the Additional School Accommodation (ASA) Scheme, from the school in question. The purpose of the ASA scheme is to ensure that essential classrooms and Special Education Needs (SEN) accommodation is available to cater for pupils enrolled each year, where the need cannot be met by the school’s existing...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: School Staff (7 Oct 2021)

Norma Foley: I am pleased to inform the Deputy that the teacher will receive salary including arrears on the next pay issue date - 14th October 2021. The Board of Managements of Schools are the employers of teachers and my Department acts as the paymaster and we act upon instruction for the school.No instruction for payment was received for the teacher concerned.The teacher made enquiries with a member...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: Educational Disadvantage (7 Oct 2021)

Norma Foley: A key part of the DEIS Plan was the introduction of a new DEIS identification process based on an objective, statistics based model to determine which schools merit inclusion in the DEIS programme. An extensive body of work has been undertaken in terms of the refinement of this model, based on the latest school enrolment data and data available from Census 2016 under the HP Deprivation Index....

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: Education Policy (7 Oct 2021)

Norma Foley: The key factor for determining the level of staffing resources provided at individual school level is the staffing schedule for the relevant school year and pupil enrolments on the previous 30 September. Primary schools are currently provided with class teachers on the basis of one teacher for every 25 pupils which is at its historically lowest level. In addition, there has been a three...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: Education Policy (7 Oct 2021)

Norma Foley: Under the Programme for Government there is a commitment to make further progress in reducing the pupil teacher ratios in primary schools. As part of the Budget 2021 measures, the Government have delivered on this commitment by the announcement of a 1 point change to the primary staffing schedule and the introduction of a three point reduction in the number of pupils needed to retain a...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: School Staff (7 Oct 2021)

Norma Foley: As part of the COVID-19 supports provided under The Roadmap for the Full Return to School, specific funding was provided to support Principals who undertake teaching duties in primary schools. This funding provides each teaching principal with a minimum of one release day per week so that each school with a teaching principal has 37 Principal Release Days. Schools have been advised...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: Education Policy (7 Oct 2021)

Norma Foley: As part of the COVID-19 supports provided to schools in 2020, additional funding of €41.2 million was allocated to provide primary schools with substitute staff. This funding allowed for the expansion of the Substitute Teacher Supply Panel from a pilot scheme consisting of 6 base schools to 132 Substitute Teacher Supply Panels nationwide, with almost 380 newly appointed Supply Panel...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: School Staff (7 Oct 2021)

Norma Foley: The key factor for determining the level of staffing resources provided at individual school level is the staffing schedule for the relevant school year and pupil enrolments on the previous 30 September. Primary schools are currently provided with class teachers on the basis of one teacher for every 25 pupils which is at its historically lowest level. In addition, there has been a three...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: Education Schemes (7 Oct 2021)

Norma Foley: I understand the need for improved capitation funding and I am pleased that budget 2020 has been able to provide for a further 2.5% increase in standard capitation funding for primary and post-primary schools that applied from the start of the 2020/21 school year. This builds on the 5% increase in capitation announced in budget 2019. The combined increases given in 2019 and 2020 mean that...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: School Funding (7 Oct 2021)

Norma Foley: The school building project referred to by the Deputy is being delivered under my Department’s Design and Build Programme. On June 14th 2021, this project was included in a bundle of projects which were tendered to a newly established Design & Build Contractors Framework. Once a Contractor has been appointed, my Department will keep the school informed of the construction...

Written Answers — Department of Education and Skills: School Funding (7 Oct 2021)

Norma Foley: The school building project referred to by the Deputy is being delivered under my Department’s Design and Build Programme. On June 14th 2021, this project was included in a bundle of projects which were tendered to a newly established Design & Build Contractors Framework. Once a Contractor has been appointed, my Department will keep the school informed of the construction...