Aengus Ó Snodaigh (Dublin South Central, Sinn Fein)
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Question 117: To ask the Minister for Education and Science the number of job losses that will result, if his plan to cap the number of English language support teachers at two per school comes into effect; and if he will reverse this decision. [38210/08]

Batt O'Keeffe (Cork North West, Fianna Fail)
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The budget measures will mean that the level of language support will be reduced from a maximum of six extra teachers per school to a maximum of two teachers per school, as was the case before 2007.

However, the ongoing requirement for current levels of language support teachers in schools should also start to reduce in line with lower levels of immigration and in line with improvements in the levels of proficiency of those pupils for whom this resource has been available.

Nonetheless, schools that require language support will still be entitled to get it. We still envisage having over 1,400 language support teachers in our schools in September 2009 and up to about 500 other teachers in part-time posts. By any standards this is a very significant resource and the challenge will be to ensure that it is used to maximum effect.

As I announced on budget day we will also provide for some alleviation for the position of those schools where there is a significant concentration of newcomer pupils as a proportion of the overall enrolment. This will be done on a case by case basis.

The allocation process for language support teachers is an annual one and existing provision is not rolled over automatically. Schools will be applying afresh in the spring and early summer of 2009 for the 2009/10 school year, based on their assessment of the prospective needs of existing pupils and any new pupils they are enrolling.

Moreover, OECD research in this field (PISA 2006) shows that Ireland is the OECD country with the highest distribution of newcomers across schools meaning that schools with higher concentrations of newcomer children are relatively unusual. ESRI data also shows that only a small percentage of schools have high concentrations of newcomer children.

I realise that standards are not simply achieved by supplying teaching resources and that the quality of the supports that the child receives and the inclusive atmosphere cultivated in schools are important factors influencing the quality of learning achieved by migrant children. My Department recognises that we must monitor and review the educational experiences that are provided to migrant students so that we can improve the quality and effectiveness of our provision. The Department is undertaking a range of research to consider the question of integration in schools and how best to deploy our resources to ensure that all the children in our schools can benefit from learning in an intercultural Ireland.