Jennifer Murnane O'Connor (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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104. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if her attention has been drawn to the fact that County Carlow has the third highest national rates of early-school-leaving, and that absenteeism rates are higher than the national average; if she has plans to support measures in County Carlow to combat this; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [49785/22]

Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail)
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The latest Retention Report published by my Department measures the percentage of students who entered the first year of post-primary school in 2014 and who (a) sat the Leaving Certificate examination in 2019 or (b) who sat the Leaving Certificate/ were provided with calculated grades in 2020. The Report shows that overall, 91.5% of the students who entered first year in 2014 sat the Leaving Certificate examination in 2019 or 2020 or were provided with calculated grades, while 97.6 % sat the Junior Certificate examination in 2017 or 2018. The retention rates for Co. Carlow in these figures was 96.7% to Junior Certificate examination and 87.5% to Leaving Certificate. As the total cohort in some counties was small the retention rate can fluctuate based on small changes from year to year.

DEIS – Delivering Equality of Opportunity in Schools is the main policy initiative of my Department to address educational disadvantage at school level. My Department provides a wide range of supports to all schools, DEIS and non-DEIS, to support the inclusion of all students and address barriers to students achieving their potential. Supplementing these universal supports, the DEIS programme provides a targeted and equitable way to address concentrated educational disadvantage that promotes equity and has benefits for students.

In March this year I was glad to be able to announce a major expansion of the DEIS – Delivering Equality of Opportunity in Schools programme. This means that, for the first time since 2017, the programme has been significantly expanded to an additional 322 schools. Those schools are now gaining access to targeted supports to address educational disadvantage. This expansion included 12 Co. Carlow primary schools who were added to the programme for the first time and 2 primary DEIS schools who were reclassified and will receive additional supports. This means that in the 2022/23 school year there are 17 Primary and 3 Post Primary DEIS schools in Co. Carlow.

Schools participating in the DEIS programme have seen retention rates to Leaving Certificate improve since the introduction of DEIS. The gap in retention rates between DEIS and non-DEIS schools has narrowed from a gap of 16.8% for the 2001 entry cohort to approx. 8.6% for the 2014 cohort.

All DEIS post-primary and DEIS urban primary schools are provided with access to supports from the Home School Community Liaison coordinator scheme, the School Completion Programme and an Educational Welfare Officer.

In the DEIS programme, the Home School Community Liaison Scheme (HSCL) seeks to promote partnership between parents, teachers and community family support services. The overarching goal of the HSCL Coordinator is to improve educational outcomes for children through their work with the key adults in the child’s life to promote attendance, participation and retention in school. All DEIS post-primary and all DEIS urban primary schools in Carlow have access to a HSCL coordinator.

The School Completion Programme (SCP) is a targeted school and community support service. The desired impact of SCP is retention of a young person to completion of the leaving certificate, equivalent qualification or suitable level of educational attainment which enables them to transition into further education, training or employment.

The Educational Welfare Service work with children and families who have difficulties in relation to school attendance, participation, retention. This is a statutory service and its primary role is to ensure that every child either attends school regularly or otherwise receives a certain minimum education; to ensure and secure every child’s entitlement to education. There are currently 2 Education Welfare Officers providing services to all schools in Co. Carlow.

It is important to note that the extension of the DEIS programme to new schools is just one phase of work in my vision for an inclusive education system which supports all learners to achieve their potential. Conscious of this and recognising the need to target resources to those schools that need them most, my Department is now working to explore the allocation of resources to schools across the education system, DEIS and non-DEIS, to tackle educational disadvantage.