Billy Timmins (Wicklow, Renua Ireland)
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170. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills to explain the reason the changes to the general allocation model have discriminated against some schools of a similar size; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [34924/15]

Jan O'Sullivan (Limerick City, Labour)
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I wish to advise the Deputy that the General Allocation Model (GAM) provides additional resource teaching, learning support, and English Additional Language support for all primary schools, and is updated annually based on the number of mainstream teaching posts in each school and in order to take account of updated enrolments.

Details of the GAM allocation process, and of GAM allocations for each school for the 2015/16 school year, are set out in DES Circular 05/2015, which is available on my Department's website at www.education.ie.

Differing teacher allocation ratios are applied under the GAM in relation to boys, girls and mixed schools in order to account for differentials of prevalence of learning difficulty between boys and girls. In addition, schools in Delivering Equality of Opportunity in Schools (DEIS) Band 1 category also receive an additional base allocation of 0.4 of a post if the school has 200 or more pupils or an additional 0.2 of a post if the school has less than 200 pupils.

The objective of this differentiation is to ensure that resources provided to schools to support children who have additional learning needs are targeted to ensure that those children most in need benefit from these resources.

The rationale for the differing ratios is based on international literature on the incidence of disability as well as international and national surveys of literacy and numeracy which indicate that there is a greater incidence of disability/learning difficulty in boys than girls.

Whereas some enhanced allocations are provided to schools to account for gender and disadvantage differentials, schools of similar size, which have the same criteria, receive the same allocation rates and are not discriminated against.

My Departments Circular 02/05 provides guidance to schools on the utilisation of resources allocated to them under the GAM. It is a matter for schools to monitor and utilise their allocation of additional teaching support to best support the needs of identified pupils, in accordance with my Department's guidance. The teaching time afforded to each individual pupil is decided and managed by schools, taking into account each child's individual learning needs.