John Cregan (Limerick West, Fianna Fail)
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Question 691: To ask the Minister for Education and Science the registered number of pupils and staffing level in a school (details supplied) in Dublin 9; if the school has received additional teachers in the past five years; if her attention has been drawn to the fact that several classes have up to 35 pupils; the maximum number of pupils allowed per class; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [27627/06]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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The staffing of a primary school for a particular school year is determined by reference to the enrolment of the school on the 30th September of the previous school year and by reference to a staffing schedule. This staffing schedule for the 2006/07 school year is outlined in Primary Circular 0023/2006 which was issued to all primary schools.

As you know all primary schools are staffed on a general rule of at least one classroom teacher for every 29 children. Of course, schools with only one or two teachers have much lower staffing ratios than that — with two teachers for just 12 pupils in some cases and so on — but the general rule is that there is at least one classroom teacher for every 29 children in the school. Next year this is being reduced to 28 children per classroom teacher and in 2007/2008 it will be reduced to 27 children per classroom teacher.

Major improvements have been made in primary school staffing in recent years. Next September there will no less than 4000 extra teachers in our primary schools compared with 2002. Not only is the average class size in our primary schools down to 24, but there is now one teacher for 17 pupils at primary level, including resource teachers etc.

So, as I have pointed out the general rule in the current school year is that at least one classroom teacher is provided for every 29 pupils. Furthermore, the actual average class size nationally is 24.

Nonetheless, some schools do have classes with more than 30 children in them. It is important to appreciate that there are a number of different reasons why a particular school may have a large class in a given year. Reasons why there are large classes include a significant fluctuation in enrolments from one year to the next and/or a decision by the school principal not to have multi-grade classes.

Regardless of the reason why there is a large class in a particular school one year, it should be noted that in the majority of cases this is not the situation in the following year. In the main, the same schools do not have large classes year after year and so the same children are not in large classes year after year.

Where some classes in a school have class sizes of greater than 29, it is often because a decision has been taken at local level to use their teaching resources to have smaller numbers in other classes. Indeed, I often find that when I look into why a particular school has a class of 35 in a particular grade, the answer is because there is another class in the same school with a much lower than average number of pupils in it.

I appreciate that splitting classes may not always be an option for a particular school, because for example there might be a large group in junior infants and a small group in sixth class and so on. But where it is possible, I believe that principals should consider the benefits of having smaller multi-grade classes as against having large differences in class sizes at different levels in the school.

The enrolment of the school referred to by the Deputy on 30th September 2005 was 261 pupils, which warrants a staffing of Principal plus 9 mainstream posts for the 2006/2007 school year. The school will also have two permanent learning support resource posts and the services of a temporary shared learning support resource post based in the school.

For the current school year, 2005/06, the number of mainstream posts in the school was reduced by 1 compared to 2004/05. However, this reduction in staffing was offset by the creation of the second permanent learning support resource post and the temporary shared learning support resource post referred to above. There have been no further posts allocated to the school in the last five years apart from these two additional posts.

This Government has clearly demonstrated its commitment to improving staffing in our primary schools by hiring thousands of extra teachers in recent years and we will continue to make progress on this issue.