Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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129. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if a process will be introduced to promote the reconfiguration of the patronage of schools in school planning areas in cases in which there is limited diversity in terms of denomination, non-denomination or single sex and co-education; the way that school planning areas will be chosen; and the way local parents can become involved. [25110/22]

Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail)
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As the Deputy will be aware I recently announced that arrangements are being put in place in a number of towns and areas of cities that have no multi-denominational primary schools to identify potential schools and to engage with school authorities, school staff and the school communities with a view to agreeing on a transfer of patronage and change of ethos, where there is sufficient demand for this.

The Council for Education of the Irish Episcopal Conference (representing the Catholic patrons) and relevant Bishops have confirmed their willingness to engage and co-operate fully with the Department in seeking to facilitate a more diverse school patronage in these towns and cities. The pilot areas are:

*parts of these cities

As part of this process, in each area the facilitator appointed by the Department, along with the relevant patron/patron representative will review data on the schools in the area and will engage directly with the relevant school authorities to progress the initiative at a local level. The process will be shaped by the stage (if any) of consideration of reconfiguration in the area concerned and whether any schools have already been identified or have opted-in at this point.

The learnings from the process in the pilot areas should provide a pathway forward on the process for providing multi-denominational options for parents in other towns and areas of the country going forward.

School communities that may be interested in exploring a transfer of patronage should engage with their school patron in the first instance.