Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 14 June 2012
91 Deputy Tom Fleming asked the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources when the roll-out of high speed broadband to all second level schools in County Kerry will commence; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [28794/12]
View answerAll post-primary schools will have a 100Mbps broadband connection installed by the end of 2014 in a project jointly funded by the Department of Communications, Energy and Natural Resources (DCENR) and the Department of Education and Skills (DES).
The selection of schools for connection during 2012 was guided by the view that a geographical rollout will provide the project with the most economically beneficial method to achieve the project objectives. This will allow for the aggregation of backhaul links to provide the optimum solution for the schools selected. It will also allow service providers to provide the local school access connection in a cost effective manner to deliver multiple schools for similar locations at a reduced cost to the Exchequer. In identifying the most appropriate locations to deliver the first round of increased bandwidth connections it was decided to concentrate on those locations receiving the lowest average speed under the DES' existing Schools Broadband Programme.
It is expected that the first 200 second level schools in the national roll out, will be connected by October 2012. These include all second level schools in the following counties:
Cavan, Clare, Donegal, Galway, Laois, Leitrim, Longford, Louth, Mayo, Monaghan, Offaly, Roscommon, Sligo and Westmeath.
The question of the scheduling of schools for connection in 2013 and 2014, including schools in County Kerry, will be dealt with at a later date, but I can confirm again that all second level schools will be provided with 100Mbps broadband by August 2014. In the meantime, the DES continues to operate its Schools Broadband Programme for all primary and post-primary schools.
