Thomas Byrne (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Tá mé buíoch den Chathaoirleach as ucht an deis seo a thabhairt dom an t-ábhar seo a lua ar an Athló anocht. I raise the Department?s current position on the allocation of teachers to Ratoath junior national school. An unprecedented number of parents have been in touch with my colleague in Ratoath, Councillor Nick Killian, and a number of parents have been in touch with me. They are most concerned at a decision of the Department, which I believe is under review today, to remove a teacher from the school. What happened in Ratoath junior national school is that 470 names were on the school roll on the first day of term in September. Ten of those names were reported to the National Education Welfare Board for various reasons which resulted in the school numbers being 460, seven short of the teacher allocation required to maintain existing staff numbers. If the decision is upheld by the Department to remove a teacher based on the lower numbers, one teacher must go and one of five junior infants? classes in the school must be reallocated to the other four classes. That is not fair. It is not right.

It is particularly unfair at this stage of the school year when children have settled into their classes if they have to be allocated to another class. That would also result in one class having at least 37 pupils and an empty classroom within the school. It might also have implications for next year in terms of whether the school would be in a position to take five classes. The school is already over the threshold for four classes in the coming year. It might not yet have reached five but it expects to do so. The school might not be able to take all of the pupils that wish to go to it next year. Therefore, if the decision is not reversed there might be pupils in Ratoath who are not accepted into the junior infants? class in the school next year. The school has already lost four teachers in the areas of resource teaching and language support and is in danger of losing a fifth mainstream teacher.

One of the criteria used in assessing such decisions is whether the post relates to a mainstream teacher. I urge the Minister to take that into account and to take the particular circumstances of Ratoath into account. It is a growing area. The pupils are already six weeks? into their school year. I urge him to please leave the teacher in place to give the children the best possible education.