John O'Mahony (Mayo, Fine Gael)
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Question 1043: To ask the Minister for Education and Science the steps being taken to counter the drop out rate, either in terms of those who do not transfer from primary to second level, or those who leave the system before completing the junior or leaving certificate; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [11166/09]

Batt O'Keeffe (Cork North West, Fianna Fail)
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My Department has adopted a broad-based approach to tackling early school leaving. This includes the establishment of the National Educational Welfare Board, under the Education Welfare Act, 2000, to monitor attendance and help to get young people back to school. The general functions of the Board are to ensure that each child attends a recognised school or otherwise receives a certain minimum education. The act is a progressive piece of legislation which raised the school leaving age to 16 or the completion of three years in senior cycle. It changed the focus on non-attendance from sanctions to a welfare approach designed to tackle the underlying causes of absenteeism and also provides for young people between the ages of 16 and 18 who opt to leave school to take up employment.

The service provided by the NEWB is just one aspect of the comprehensive framework that the Government has put in place to support schools, families and young people. Targeted interventions under DEIS (Delivering Equality of Opportunity in Schools), the Action Plan for Educational Inclusion, include the School Completion Programme, Home School Community Liaison services, additional funding for pupils at risk of early school leaving and alternative curricular options. Enhancing attendance, progression, retention and attainment are central elements of the DEIS programme. In the current school year, €18.3m was paid in grants to schools to meet the needs of pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds under DEIS. These financial supports allocated to each of the schools selected under DEIS provide for the inclusion of after school and holiday time support, for literacy and numeracy development as well as homework support, social and personal development and arts activities.

In addition to the NEWB, there are currently in excess of 600 staff within the education sector working in various educational disadvantage programmes of which over 130 are additional posts allocated under DEIS. Work is ongoing within the Department of Education and Science to enhance the delivery of its services through collaboration and integrated work between the NEWB and NCSE and various programmes operating under the School Support Programme initiatives. The NEWB is also developing protocols for collaboration with agencies and services at regional and national level that provide services for children, young people and families.

My Department has also widened the range of curricula available to students by promoting the Junior Certificate Schools Programme, the Leaving Certificate Vocational Programme, and the Leaving Certificate Applied Programme in addition to the traditional Junior and Leaving Certificate curricula.

Preventative measures are also in place such as the School Completion Programme and the Home School Community Liaison Scheme (HSCL), with €31 million allocated to the School Completion Programme and in the region of €32 million allocated to HSCL for 2009. Some 224 post-primary schools and 468 primary schools now participate in the School Completion Programme countrywide. The Management Committees of SCP engage in a consultative and planning process with the school staff, with parents and with local representatives of relevant statutory and voluntary agencies in the development of annual retention plans. The Local Retention Plans contain strategies for the whole-school, targeted strategies for individual students, and those who are already outside of the formal system. Provision includes in-school, after-school and holiday time supports to enhance the young person's readiness to benefit from education.

The National Co-ordination Team of the School Completion Programme have also published Guidelines on Identifying Young People at Risk of Early School Leaving in order to assist SCP projects identify good practices for targeting young people at risk of early school leaving.

The Home School Community Liaison scheme is a major mainstream preventative strategy targeted at the families of pupils at risk of not reaching their potential in the educational system because of background characteristics which tend to affect adversely pupil attainment and school retention. HSCL focuses directly on the salient adults in children's educational lives, seeking indirect benefits for the children themselves and works to involve parents in their children's education which is a crucial component in convincing young people of the value of education. HSCL coordinators are assigned on a full time or shared basis between schools and are deployed to do full-time home school community liaison duties.

Progression from primary to second-level is recognised as a crucial transition period in a child's education. Under the DEIS action plan, a continuing emphasis will be placed on the development of effective transfer programmes by building on the existing work of the Home School Community Liaison Scheme and the School Completion Programme.

I would like to assure the Deputy that we have greatly intensified our efforts in recent years to keep more young people in school and I will continue to prioritise further progress in this area.