Anne Rabbitte (Galway East, Fianna Fail)
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1499. To ask the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs the full cost of training a person in the Aistear and Síolta programmes. [1115/18]

Katherine Zappone (Dublin South West, Independent)
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The National Síolta AistearInitiative (NSAI) was established in 2016 to support the national coordinated roll-out of Síoltaand Aistear, the national quality and curriculum frameworks for early childhood education. The initiative is being funded by my Department and is being developed in collaboration with the Early Years Education Policy Unit (EYEPU) in the Department of Education and Skills (DES) and the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NCCA).

55 Síoltaand Aistearmentors from a range of National Voluntary Childcare organisations (NVCOs) and City/County Childcare Committees (CCCs) have been trained and are providing supports to early years settings to implement both Síoltaand Aistear on a national basis. Currently Síolta Aistearmentors from CCCs are back filled at an hourly rate of €30 to provide 10 hours of supports within the NSAI activities per month. From February-June 2018 the amount of mentoring hours available per mentor, per month will increase to a maximum of 20 hours.

There are a range of training, coaching and mentoring supports within the NSAI which mentors can provide based on local needs and context. These include introductory and awareness raising supports, training in aspects of Síoltaand Aistearand on site mentoring and coaching supports which are individualised to the particular needs of settings. Therefore, the amount of time and intensity of support that is provided to each setting is based on a needs assessment and may vary between settings due to the diversity of needs, size, capacity etc. On average, a service which is going through the formal QAP requires approximately 120-150 hours of mentoring at a cost of €30 per hour.

A pilot CPD programme to support practitioners and services to use the Aistear Curriculum Framework and the Aistear-Síolta online practice guide was run in 2017 by the NCCA and selected Síolta Aistear mentors. The pilot programme consisted of 109 hours being delivered by each of 27 mentors to 401 participants/162 settings at a cost of €45,630 (this figure is cost for mentor hours @€15 per hour and printing grant of €55 per mentor. The practitioners availing of the CPD received 10 hours of training and 4 hours of on-site coaching in their setting.

The content of the CPD programme is now under review and a revised programme will be available for implementation by September 2018. The model for delivery of the CPD materials is also under review so that a model that is cost effective and with national reach can be put in place and costed.

Overall the cost of expenditure for the NSAI in 2017, including the salaries of the two national Co-ordinators, was €185,899.05.

In addition to the NSAI, my Department also provides funding to the NVCOs and CCCs to undertake a range of quality improvement supports, guided by Síoltaand Aistear. NVCOs currently carry out supports within the NSAI as part of their core work which is funded by my Department.