Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail)
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I wish to confirm to the Deputy that my Department is in receipt of an application from the school in question under the Department's Additional Accommodation Scheme.

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.

Officials from my Department have recently corresponded with the school authority and on receipt of their response the application will be progressed and the decision will issue to the school authority directly.