Peter Mathews (Dublin South, Independent)
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113. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills the steps he intends to take to address the increasing numbers of disadvantaged children within the education system in view of the significant reduction in funding to support such children; the psychological supports being provided to children from grossly indebted families; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [42143/13]

Ruairi Quinn (Dublin South East, Labour)
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The majority of schools include among their pupils, children with disadvantaged backgrounds, and in general most schools address the individual needs of these children without recourse to additional targeted resources.

DEIS "Delivering Equality of Opportunity in Schools" an action plan for educational inclusion focuses on addressing the educational needs of children and young people from the most disadvantaged communities. There are currently 852 schools, comprising 658 primary and 194 second-level schools are participating in DEIS, with an overall enrolment of almost 167,000 young people. These schools are eligible for a range of additional supports including additional funding to assist them in working to improve attendance, retention and educational outcomes for their students with lower pupil-teacher ratios for those schools with the highest levels of disadvantage.

In the current climate my Department's main focus is to retain, where possible, key resources in the schools targeted under the DEIS initiative. To this end resources in DEIS schools have been protected, with no overall changes to DEIS-related staffing levels or DEIS funding in 2013.

I can inform the Deputy that all primary and post primary schools have access to psychological assessments either directly through my Department's National Educational Psychological Service (NEPS) or where a NEPS psychologist is not available to a given school through a panel of private practitioners maintained under the Scheme for Commissioning Psychological Assessments (SCPA) which is administered by NEPS.

NEPS has adopted a consultative model of service. The focus is on empowering teachers to intervene effectively with pupils whose needs range from mild to severe and transient to enduring. Psychologists use a problem solving and solution focused consultative approach to maximize positive outcomes for these pupils. NEPS encourages schools to use a continuum based assessment and intervention process whereby each school takes responsibility for initial assessment, educational planning and remedial intervention for pupils with learning, emotional or behavioural difficulties.

Teachers may consult their NEPS psychologist should they need to at this stage in the process. Only in the event of a failure to make reasonable progress, in spite of the school's best efforts in consultation with NEPS, will the psychologist become involved with an individual child for intensive intervention. This system allows psychologists to give early attention to urgent cases and also to help many more children indirectly than could be seen individually. It also ensures that children are not referred unnecessarily for psychological intervention. This process has been embedded by NEPS psychologists in the Primary sector with the production by the Department of Special Educational Needs – A Continuum of Support guidance and resource materials which has been distributed to all schools since 2007/8. In late 2010 similar support documentation was produced in relation to Emotional and Behavioural difficulties in the Primary sector and in relation to a formal Post-Primary Continuum process.