Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire (Cork South Central, Sinn Fein)
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584. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if the €18 million allocated to DEIS under budget 2022 includes funding to reduce the staffing schedule for DEIS urban band 1 schools by one point. [51058/21]

Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail)
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As part of continuing measures to sustain and strengthen primary schools and in accordance with a commitment in the Programme for Government to make further progress in reducing pupil teacher ratios, the staffing schedule in all primary schools will be improved by one point from September 2022. The effect of this change will be to allow primary schools operating the standard staffing schedule to reduce the general average from 25:1 to 24:1, a historically low level. This follows a similar one point reduction in Budget 2021.

The staffing schedules in place for DEIS schools will also benefit from the one point reduction. DEIS Urban Band 1 staffing schedule will move to 18:1 for Junior Schools, 20:1 for Vertical schools and 22:1 for Senior Schools. All DEIS Urban Band 2 schools and DEIS rural schools will move to a PTR of 24:1.

This benefit in the staffing schedule for DEIS schools is in addition to the Budget 2022 allocation of €18million for 2022 and €32million for 2023, to extend the DEIS programme to further schools with the highest levels of disadvantage.

Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire (Cork South Central, Sinn Fein)
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585. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if all primary schools, including all DEIS primary schools, will benefit from the one-point reduction in the pupil teacher ratio in Budget 2022. [51059/21]

Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail)
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Under the Programme for Government there is a commitment to seek to make further progress in reducing the pupil teacher ratios in primary schools. 

At primary level, the annual staffing schedule determines the allocation of teachers to schools. The current allocation is on an average ratio of 1 classroom teacher for every 25 pupils.  Budget 2022 has implemented a further 1 point reduction for the 2022/23 school year so that primary schools will be allocated teaching posts on an average basis of 1 classroom teacher for every 24 pupils in September 2022.  Lower thresholds apply to DEIS Urban Band 1 schools which will also benefit from the improvement to the staffing schedule next year.

This Budget measure has brought the teacher allocation ratio in all primary schools to the lowest ever seen at primary level.  This is the second successive Budget which has seen an improvement in allocation of teachers to primary schools.