Tony McLoughlin (Sligo-Leitrim, Fine Gael)
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172. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills the reason schools in counties Sligo and Leitrim were not included in his Department's pilot scheme for physical education for the leaving certificate programme; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [11793/18]

Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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A very significant number of schools, approximately 360, applied to participate in the Phase 1 rollout of Leaving Certificate Physical Education (LCPE) and/or the Senior Cycle Physical Education (SCPE) Framework, with many applications being of high quality. Given that a limited number of 80 schools was selected for participation in phase 1 it was inevitable that a large number of schools that submitted quality applications would unfortunately not be selected.  However, it is my intention that all schools will be able to offer LCPE (examinable) and/or SCPE (non-examinable) from September 2020, with preparation for their introduction commencing during the 2019/20 school year.

The Steering Group chaired by this Department to oversee the implementation of LCPE and SCPE considered the responses provided by schools to the Phase 1 School Selection Survey, many of which demonstrated high levels of satisfaction against the relevant criteria. The Steering Group also sought to ensure that the schools selected included a broad spread by school type. The requirement to select a relatively small number of schools to form the phase 1 cohort has resulted in a much larger number of schools being disappointed not to be selected. However, it was important that a limited number of schools be chosen for this first phase in order to ensure a managed introduction of the subject and framework in the schools selected and to facilitate the intensive engagement required to gain the necessary learning to facilitate the planned later rollout to all interested schools.