Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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136. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills the stage the review of the school support programme through the DEIS initiative is at; when this review will be completed and published; if he envisages changes to the funding or delivery model of the DEIS programme; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [24944/17]

Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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As I previously advised the Deputy on 28th February last, the review of DEIS has been completed and is available on my Department's website at the following link:

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On 13th February, I published DEIS Plan 2017, which sets out my Department’s renewed policy statement on  educational disadvantage.

Building on the five key goals set out in the Action Plan for Education 2016-2019, the Key Goals we have set ourselves in this DEIS Plan are:

1. To implement more robust and responsive assessment framework for identification of schools and effective resource allocation

2. To improve the learning experience and outcomes of pupils in DEIS schools

3. To improve the capacity of school leaders and teachers to engage, plan and deploy resources to their best advantage

4. To support and foster best practice in schools through inter-agency collaboration

5. To support the work of schools by providing the research, information, evaluation and feedback to achieve the goals of the plan.

The DEIS Plan identifies more than 100 actions in support of the goals we have identified. These actions will ensure that the targets we have set will be achieved and learners most at risk of disadvantage will experience improved outcomes.

Those actions include the following:

- School leaders and teachers in DEIS schools will be prioritised for accessing professional leadership training, preparation courses for newly appointed principals, mentoring and coaching courses

- The connections between pre-schools and primary schools in communities will be strengthened

- Schools will be asked, in the annual review of their School Plan, to set specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time specific targets, including targets for literacy and numeracy, CPD and leadership and to evaluate these annually

- A pilot approach to identify effective interventions and explore how these and further creativity around teaching and learning, and the delivery of other supports have made effective use of the resources available to schools to achieve good educational outcomes will be adopted

- A new School Excellence Fund to support the implementation of new interventions and help broker the necessary resources from the various support agencies

- Greater prioritisation of NEPS service to DEIS schools.

The plan can be accessed at the following link: