Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael)
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173. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if she is making any contingency plans for the possibility of having to provide school places for a wave of refugees coming to Europe and Ireland from Sudan due to the war, famine and humanitarian crisis unfolding there; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [37502/24]

Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail)
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Integration and utilisation of each school’s existing capacity in the most flexible way possible is key to supporting IPA arrivals.

Regional Education and Language Teams, or REALTs, were established as part of the Department of Education’s response to the humanitarian crisis arising from the war in Ukraine to assist Ukrainian families, among other things, in securing school places.

The primary role of the REALT is to build on existing regional education support structures and co-ordinate the provision of education services to schools and families across their defined areas.

The remit of the REALTs was extended in November 2022 to include supporting non-Ukrainian IPAS arrivals and children under the Irish Refugee Protection Programme (IRPP) to find school places. The current Tusla Education Support Service (TESS) team continue to operate as normal with new arrivals and work closely with the 16 REALT co-ordinators in the regions and request supports from the REALT when needed to assist with the enrolment in schools. The statutory role of Tusla to ensure that all children aged 6 to 16 are in receipt of an education is not affected.

All of the relevant information in relation to the Department’s approach and the supports in place is available on the Department’s website at