Vol. 547 No. 2
22 Mr. Bradford asked the Minister for Education and Science the way in which he proposes to enable schools maintain discipline and control in classrooms arising from the recent court case involving a school principal in County Wicklow. [2841/02]
Each board of management is responsible for formulating, in consultation with parents, a fair and efficient code of behaviour. This code should ensure that the individuality of each child is accommodated while acknowledging the right of each child to education in a relatively disruption free environment. It should include provision for dealing with serious breaches of discipline and continuously disruptive pupils.
My Department has issued guidelines to boards of management to assist them in discharging their obligations in the area of school discipline. These guidelines were drawn up following consultation with representatives of management, teachers and parents, and are sufficiently flexible to allow each school authority to adapt them to suit the particular needs of the school. These guidelines lay considerable stress on the use of suspensions and expulsions only as a last resort.
In addition, I have brought forward a comprehensive range of legislative measures in the Education (Welfare) Act to address general issues related to school attendance and discipline in schools. The legislation provides for the establishment of a National Educational Welfare Board with responsibility for monitoring school attendance on a country-wide basis. I have already set up this board on an interim basis and it has begun its work. The board will employ educational welfare officers, who will be deployed locally to assist all recognised primary and second level schools. The Act requires schools to report suspensions for a period of not less than six days to their local educational welfare officer. Schools will also be required to report to their educational welfare officer before expelling any student. In such instances, the role of the educational welfare officer will be to bring together the relevant parties to try to identify a mutually agreeable solution to provide for the education of the student concerned. The automatic involvement of the educational welfare officer in these situations will provide a key means for the early identification and support of children at risk of dropping out of school.
