Seán Crowe (Dublin South West, Sinn Fein)
Link to this: Individually | In context

Question 174: To ask the Minister for Education and Skills, in view of changes to the allocation of school guidance counsellors, when schools are forced to redeploy their school guidance counsellors, if he will clarify the following, namely, the person who will set and correct the assessment test for incoming first years; the person who is qualified to conduct and correct differential aptitude tests for our third year classes; the person who will make contact with the primary schools of all incoming first years in order to build up a profile for teachers at the beginning of the school year; the person who will provide the essential counselling service to students who have problems in their personal or home lives; the person who will advise leaving certificate students on their subject choices and on filling in their CAO forms; the person who will organise trips to career seminars; the person who will organise the annual study skills seminars for first, third and sixth years as well as the accompanying talk for parents; the person who will explain to the third years, transition year students and their parents about their subject choices for the leaving certificate course; and the person who will coordinate the pastoral care system in the school. [13530/12]

Ruairi Quinn (Dublin South East, Labour)
Link to this: Individually | In context

My Department has just recently published Circular 0009/2012 to inform all post primary school management and staff of the staffing arrangements for post-primary schools for the 2012/13 school year, including in particular, the requirements to manage guidance from within the standard allocation. The circular is available on the Department website.Schools will have autonomy on how best to prioritise its available resources to meet its requirements in relation to guidance and the provision of an appropriate range of subjects to its students. Decisions on how this is done will be taken at school level and I am confident that schools will act in the best interest of students when determining precisely how to use the teaching resources available to them.