Martin Browne (Tipperary, Sinn Fein)
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228. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if she is aware of the increase in class sizes in a school (details supplied). [5934/23]

Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail)
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As the Deputy is aware from Budget 2023, the staffing schedule will be 23:1 in mainstream primary schools from the 2023/24 school year, with lower rates applying in the DEIS Urban Band 1 schools. This is a further reduction on the already historically low level and the first time such a reduction has been made in three consecutive Budgets.

The school to which the Deputy refers currently has a project at Stage 1 which will deliver three mainstream classrooms, two SET rooms, and two classrooms for pupils with special educational needs.

The purpose of my Department’s Additional School Accommodation (or ASA) scheme is to ensure that essential mainstream classroom accommodation and accommodation for pupils with special education needs is available to cater for pupils enrolled each year, where the need cannot be met by the school’s existing accommodation.

At primary level, this situation generally arises to cater for a school’s accommodation requirements where an additional teaching post has been sanctioned by Teacher Allocation Section, or the requirement for a new class for pupils with special education needs has been identified by the NCSE, and all available alternative accommodation within the school is already being used for classroom purposes.

I wish to advise the Deputy that my Department is in receipt of an application for further additional school accommodation, from the school authority in question. Based on the school’s enrolments on 30 September 2022, it is expected that the staffing cohort will remain at the current level. In that regard, an additional mainstream classroom is not required at this time.