The draft report from the Department of Education and Science on educational disadvantage is a very significant document. It is unusually blunt in its assessment of current projects which are funded at a cost of €300 million a year.
The various responses to educational disadvantage require much greater coherence. There is insufficient co-ordination between the huge number of schemes designed to combat the problem. Evaluation of the various schemes is insufficient in many cases. Crucially, there is "a lack of an objective, robust system for identifying, and regularly reviewing, levels of disadvantage in schools."
There is a refreshing degree of candour in this report. It records how up to 30 per cent of children in poorer areas continue to suffer severe literacy problems. Despite increased resources, there is little evidence of any improvement in standards, it says. It also highlights the very high drop-out rate from schools before the Leaving Cert exam.
The Department of Education and Science proposes what it terms an "Action Plan for Success" to address the problem. Mr John Carr, general secretary of the INTO is right when he says there is much to be commended in this five-year action plan. The Department envisages a new banding system for schools. An extensive set of criteria will be used to identify the schools and the pupils with the greatest need. The current imprecise system for identifying schools will be abolished. Priority schools will receive the highest levels of support. All of this is sensible and overdue.
For all that, the report is short on specifics when it comes to additional resources. It does not signal the type of quantum leap in funding for primary education, in particular, demanded by both the INTO and the Labour Party in policy statements last week.
As the report makes clear, money alone will not resolve a multi-faceted problem like educational disadvantage. But it will, amongst other things, help to provide more special needs support, more specialised assistance with literacy and numeracy problems and more homework clubs. Must we continue with a situation where a large number of second-level principals must seek funds from St Vincent de Paul to help disadvantaged children, as the conference of the National Association of Principals and Deputy Principals heard last week?
There are encouraging signs that the new Minister, Ms Hanafin, will give educational disadvantage the priority it merits. Implementation of the Department's report, and a commitment to vastly increased funding in the forthcoming Budget, could make a real difference to tens of thousands of our children.