Liz McManus (Wicklow, Labour)
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Question 551: To ask the Minister for Education and Science her views on reports of unacceptably high pupil teacher ratios currently in place at a school (details supplied) in County Wicklow; the way this school compares to international best practice; the way this school compares to figures provided in the Government's Progress Report on Education; the steps she is taking to improve the situation; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [33120/06]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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The staffing in the school referred to by the Deputy for the 2006/2007 school year is as follows: 1 Principal Post, 7 Mainstream Class Teacher Posts, 1 Permanent Developing School Post, 3 Permanent Learning Support/Resource Post, 1 Temporary Language Support Post. My Department recently received the September Salary Return form from the Board of Management of the School. This form indicated that there were 218 pupils enrolled in the school on the 30th September 2006.

As the Deputy will be aware, major improvements have been made in staffing at primary in recent years. At the beginning of the current school year there are no less than 4000 extra teachers in our primary schools, compared with 2002.

The average class size in our primary schools is 24 and there is now one teacher for 17 pupils at primary level. Children with special needs and those from disadvantaged areas are getting more support than ever before to help them to make the most of their time at school.

Indeed, with the thousands of extra primary teachers hired by this Government, recent years have seen the largest expansion in teacher numbers since the expansion of free education. Over the next two school years even more teachers will be put in place both for the above priority areas of disadvantage and special education and also under a reduction in the mainstream staffing schedule.

As the Deputy knows all primary schools are staffed on a general rule of at least one classroom teacher for every 28 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 28 children in the school. Next year (2007/2008 school year) this is being reduced to 27 children per classroom teacher.

A further initiative that has been of direct benefit to primary schools has been the change in the criteria for developing schools. For the current school year the threshold for getting a developing school post was reduced specifically to help schools that are seeing large increases in enrolments each year. 170 such posts were sanctioned in the 2005/06 school year, compared to 105 in 2004/05. This Government has shown a clear determination to improve the staffing in our schools and we will continue to prioritise this issue going forward.