Pat Deering (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fine Gael)
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1373. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills her plans to restore the minor works grant paid to primary schools; if so, when same will be paid; if her attention has been drawn to the fact that a review was due to take place of disadvantaged status for schools over four years ago; her plans to carry out such a review so that some schools can apply for disadvantaged status. [33916/14]

Jan O'Sullivan (Limerick City, Labour)
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Circular Letter 0062/2013 which was published as the Minor Works Grant for the school year 2013/2014 issued last November states "the grant will only be paid in future years as funding permits". The focus under the Infrastructure and Capital Investment Programme 2012-2016 is on meeting the demand for additional school places. Consequently, there is no funding provided at this time in the 2014 capital allocation for the payment of a Minor Works Grant.

The DEIS (Delivering Equality of Opportunity in Schools) programme is the subject of ongoing evaluation by both the Educational Research Centre and the Department's Inspectorate.This research was the subject of a research seminar in May 2014 entitled Learning from DEIS.At this seminar, the former Minister for Education and Skills, announced plans to commission one further piece of research in relation to DEIS to provide recommendations for a renewal of the Government's policy in relation to educational disadvantage, including DEIS.A procurement process to produce a "Consolidated Report on the Learning from the Evaluation of DEIS" is currently underway.