Written answers
Thursday, 8 May 2025
Department of Education and Skills
Teacher Training
Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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334. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if she will lift the cap on the number of primary teacher training places imposed on public universities; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [23237/25]
Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael)
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There are 5 Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) providing primary Initial Teacher Education (ITE) in Ireland; four State-funded providers and one private provider.
Each of the four primary State-funded providers has both concurrent (undergraduate) and consecutive (postgraduate) programmes: These are:
- DCU Institute of Education
- Marino Institute of Education
- Maynooth University (Froebel Department of Primary and Early Childhood Education)
- Mary Immaculate College.
- an additional 90 places per year were approved for mainstream undergraduate ITE programmes, and
- an additional 200 places per year were approved on the primary Professional Master of Education (PME) programmes.
An additional 30 places were also approved for the B. Oid. (the Irish-medium B.Ed. in Marino Institute) for 2023/24, which represents the greatest number of additional places which could be made available under the terms of the procurement process which established the course.
It is acknowledged that there are challenges around the availability of teachers at present. While there are currently no plans to lift the cap on the number of primary teacher training places, the Department’s ongoing approach is to continue to develop further innovative measures to improve the availability of teachers.
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