Written answers
Thursday, 12 July 2018
Department of Education and Skills
DEIS Administration
Seán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail)
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143. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if funding will be provided for a project to be included in the Delivering Equality of Opportunity in Schools, DEIS, scheme for funding (details supplied); and if he will make a statement on the matter. [31639/18]
Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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DEIS – Delivering Equality of Opportunity in Schools, is my Department’s main policy initiative to tackle educational disadvantage. I wish to advise the Deputy that the DEIS Programme is only available in primary and post-primary schools.
DEIS Plan 2017, published in February 2017, seeks to build on what has already been achieved by schools who have benefitted from the additional supports available under the initial DEIS programme introduced in 2005.
A number of recommendations in the DEIS Plan 2017 relate to early years provision. In terms of direct funding for pre-school provision, since 1994, my Department has funded Early Start classes in 40 DEIS schools. A proposal to expand this programme was set out in the DEIS Action Plan for Educational Inclusion 2005, however a decision not to proceed with this proposal was taken in light of the introduction of the universal Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) Programme, which provides universal free pre-school to all children.
From September 2018, all children will be entitled to receive two full years of free pre-school provision under the ECCE programme. Resource allocation for pre-school services in disadvantage communities funded under the ECCE programme is a matter for my colleague, Minister Zappone, T.D, and the Department of Children and Youth Affairs (DCYA). Since the introduction of the ECCE programme, Government investment in the early year’s sector has been primarily focussed on universal ECCE provision, and my Department works closely with the DCYA to build capacity in the ECCE sector, particularly around the quality of educational provision in ECCE centres.
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