Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Labour)
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Question 720: To ask the Minister for Education and Science the reason a school (details supplied) in Dublin 11 has been excluded from the DEIS Programme, in view of the fact that all other 11 disadvantaged schools in the local area have been included; if her attention has been drawn to the fact that staff in the school feel they are being penalised because of the success of their work to date; and if she will agree to review this decision on the grounds of fairness to the pupils and staff concerned. [28069/06]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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DEIS (Delivering Equality of Opportunity in Schools), the action plan for educational inclusion, provides for a standardised system for identifying levels of disadvantage and a new integrated School Support Programme (SSP). The School Support Programme will bring together, and build upon, a number of existing interventions in schools with a concentrated level of disadvantage. The process of identifying primary and second-level schools for participation in the SSP was managed by the Educational Research Centre (ERC) on behalf of my Department and supported by quality assurance work co-ordinated through the Department's regional offices and the Inspectorate. As a result of the identification process, 840 schools were invited to participate in the SSP. These comprised 640 primary schools (320 urban/town schools and 320 rural schools) and 200 second-level schools. I am delighted to say that 833 of the schools invited to join the new programme accepted the invitation. Schools that did not qualify for the new programme will keep the extra resources they are getting under pre-existing schemes for the 2006/07 school year and after that they will continue to get support in line with the level of disadvantage among their pupils. A review process has been put in place for both primary and second-level schools. The review process applies only to those primary schools that participated in the ERC survey in May 2005 and only to those eligible second-level schools for which data were available from the relevant databases. The closing date for receipt of review applications was Friday, 31st March, 2006. The school referred to by the Deputy has submitted a review application. The review process is nearing completion and the review group will shortly be making recommendations to my Department in the case of each school that has sought a review after which each school will be written to as regards the outcome of their application.