asked the Minister for Education the role which is envisaged for the new Primary Curriculum Review Body in view of the announcement by her on 22 October 1987 that the new Curriculum and Assessment Advisory Council will take over responsibility for the primary curriculum review.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Primary Curriculum Review Body.
10.
The Primary Curriculum Review Body will continue with the task assigned to them. They will report directly to the Minister as envisaged and announced. The National Curriculum Council, as part of their brief, will oversee the work of this Primary Curriculum Review Body. I hope Deputy Higgins agrees with it.
Is the £230,000 in the Estimates for 1988 for expenses of the curriculum review, the same amount as provided in 1987, to cover both the primary curriculum review and the new national council for curriculum and assessment? Are both bodies to be in the same building and to have the same secretariat? Are there any arrangements for liaison? Can the Minister answer all those questions before we go on to the next business?
The £230,000 as envisaged in our budget and as announced for 1988 will be used to oversee the work of the primary review and to conduct the work of the curriculum council. That is in line with our Government policy of increased productivity from all sectors. Having met yesterday the curriculum council and their chief executive, I am satisfied that they have with great confidence accepted the dual role assigned to them. Work has already commenced on the primary review. They are meeting quite regularly and they are carrying out their work. I understand that the chief executive of the curriculum council will now convene the next meeting following the nomination from constituent bodies of the various members to the board. The Deputy asked if the two bodies will meet in the one office. The offices of the curriculum council remain as they always have been as do the chairperson, the vice-chairperson, executive and staffing. The Primary Curriculum Review Body have to this point met in a certain place. I do not know if they intend to remain in that place but they have been holding their meetings very effectively and have been serviced in their secretariat, collection of data, compilation of research and so on by what was the interim board and is now the curriculum council.
I am very interested in the names that seem to be changing constantly. I thought that the name of the body the Minister announced yesterday included the word "assessment". However, I will not go into that.
Curriculum council and assessment——
Is it "curriculum and assessment council"?
Curriculum council and assessment.
That is not English. It does not make sense. I presume the Minister means "curriculum and assessment council". I am not surprised the Minister is confused because she set up two bodies to do the work which one body were doing extremely well. Would she not agree that this desperate setting up of bodies to conduct work which was already under way and being extremely well done by the body in existence is a total waste of resources and an example of Fianna Fáil's fear of any initiative that was undertaken by any other Government?
Not at all. I know what is wrong with the Deputy. She is annoyed. I have decided my priorities and, as I said here some months ago, I will never come into this House to apologise for my educational beliefs. I saw two tasks ahead of me with regard to curriculum reform. One which the Deputy's interim board saw as a major priority was that they would initiate a review of the primary school curriculum.
Why do they need somebody else?
In four years they never got round to doing it but they identified it as a major area of need in the review of primary schools. They then identified an ongoing and very thorough review of the post-primary curriculum which I am now doing. The Deputy's second question knocks the argument of the first one which was whether the one amount of money was to be used to do the two jobs. Her second question was to ask what was the idea of the two bodies. One body is overseeing the work of the primary school curriculum review. They have been set up and are proceeding with great gusto to do their job. They will report to me in about 12 to 15 months. They have a limited, tight brief and a tight schedule of work. They will issue their report and then their work will finish. The newly formed, re-constituted curriculum council who were set up yesterday are glad to have the expertise of the chairperson and vice-chairperson whom the Deputy herself appointed to the interim board and the secretariat and funding available to them. I have absolutely no doubt that both of these committees are going to work with great confidence and very rigorously to oversee all of the work of curriculum reform. Any confusion which existed in the area of curriculum reform up to now will be cleared away by the clear brief which has been given to each of the committees. Let me put on record Deputy Hussey's commitment to curriculum reform. I admit freely she started the process and I am glad she did so. I wish the two bodies great success in their work.
To be continued tonight.
I want to deal with Deputy J. Higgins's Question No. 11 in which he showed an interest before I go on to priority questions.
In relation to these moving and overlapping bodies which the Minister has described, what provision exists for taking the opinions of non-denominational schools, multi-denominational schools, Church of Ireland schools and scoileanna lán Gaeilge into account? Why were they excluded from representation on the advisory council?
I understand the National Parents' Council represent all parents of pupils and students on a completely non-denominational basis.
Do you?
That is the remit they had when they set themselves up. Any body, grouping or segment in education who wish to make submissions or to have their views entertained or noted by the Primary Curriculum Review Body or by the curriculum council will be given very great attention by the very dedicated staff there.
Why are they not on the curriculum.
I understand this is very likely to be the subject matter of a Private Members' Bill commencing tonight and Members will have adequate time to discuss it in great depth and detail.
The Minister has assured us that this new board are up and coming at a rate I had not realised; they are up and galloping. How soon can we see a pilot programme in operation in one of our primary schools as a result of this acceleration of development and assessment of the curriculum at primary school level?
The Deputy is talking about the Primary Curriculum Review Body. As she said, they are up and doing their work. I have asked them to report to me in 12 to 15 months. That was in October so perhaps by December 1988 or the following January they will report.
If the Minister is still there.
Following that report, I will of course scrutinise its findings carefully, submit them to Government and — Deputy Quill's idea is a good one — then extract the findings and initiate a pilot project based on the findings of the review body. That is the way I intend it to go.