Brian O'Shea (Waterford, Labour)
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Question 409: To ask the Minister for Education and Science if a permanent concessionary post was granted to a school (details supplied) in County Waterford based on the school's disadvantaged status in February 1994; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [37530/05]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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The school to which the Deputy refers was awarded designated disadvantaged status under the disadvantaged areas scheme in 1994. Under this scheme the school benefits from the services of a home-school-community liaison teacher post and each year is in receipt of additional supplementary capitation at the rate of €38.09 per pupil and a refund of the television licence fee. Schools included in the disadvantaged areas scheme in 1994 were included for capitation grant purposes only and were not allocated a permanent disadvantaged concessionary post.

Since 2001, the Giving Children an Even Break programme subsumes the previous process of designation of schools that serve areas of educational disadvantage and my Department's approach is now refined to ensure that individual at risk pupils are targeted. Rather than the old method of designating additional schools, under this scheme my Department provides support that is commensurate with the levels of concentration in schools of pupils with characteristics that are associated with educational disadvantage and early school-leaving. The school to which the Deputy refers receives additional financial resources to provide educational supports to be targeted at disadvantaged pupils and retained its entitlements as a designated disadvantaged school.

The recommended guideline for the maximum class size for schools that are designated disadvantaged is 29:1. When a designated disadvantaged school exceeds this guideline an additional mainstream teaching post, referred to as a maximum class size post, is sanctioned by my Department. The school referred to by the Deputy has a maximum class size post.

A key element of DEIS, delivering equality of opportunity in schools, the new action plan for educational inclusion, is the putting in place of a standardised system for identifying levels of disadvantage in our primary and second level schools for the purposes of qualifying for resources, both human and financial, according to the degree of disadvantage experienced. This standardised system will replace all of the existing arrangements for targeting schools for participation in initiatives to address disadvantage. As a result of the identification process, approximately 600 primary schools, comprising 300 urban or town and 300 rural, and 150 second level schools will be included in a new school support programme, SSP. The SSP will bring together and build upon a number of existing interventions for schools and school clusters and communities with a concentrated level of educational disadvantage. Existing schemes and programmes will be integrated into the school support programme on a phased basis in the implementation period.

We anticipate being in a position to notify participating schools of the outcome of the ongoing identification process by the end of the year.