Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 11 February 2014
186. Deputy Jonathan O'Brien asked the Minister for Education and Skills if his Department liaises with each school to ensure it has developed a school guidance plan in order to meet the needs of students. [6253/14]
View answer189. Deputy Jonathan O'Brien asked the Minister for Education and Skills his plans to meet the national executive of the Institute of Guidance Counsellors to discuss its concerns regarding cutbacks on the provision of guidance in schools. [6256/14]
View answer190. Deputy Jonathan O'Brien asked the Minister for Education and Skills if he will provide an update on the guidelines drawn up in the framework document for considering the provision of guidance in post-primary schools, September 2012, which have not been implemented due to the severe curtailment of resources and the reassignment of guidance counsellors to subject teaching duties; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [6257/14]
View answerI propose to take Questions Nos. 186, 189 and 190 together.
Guidance is a whole school activity and schools have autonomy on how best to prioritise their available resources to meet the requirements in relation to guidance and the provision of an appropriate range of subjects to students. This operates at local school level. The representative organisations for School Principals and school management developed a framework that assists schools on how best to manage the provision of guidance from within their staffing allocation. This approach has been adapted and puts a greater emphasis on group-work and class-based activity at senior cycle and maximises the amount of time available for those pupils that need one to one support.
Since September 2012 guidance provision is now being organised by school management from within the staffing schedule allocation. In this way principals have discretion to balance guidance needs with the pressures to provide subject choice. My Department helped shelter the impact for DEIS post-primary schools by improving their standard staffing allocations. All 195 second-level schools in DEIS have been given targeted support by a more favourable staffing schedule of 18.25:1. This is a 0.75 point reduction compared to the existing PTR of 19:1 that applies in non fee-paying second-level schools (23:1 in fee-charging schools). I am not in a position to meet with the National Executive of the Institute of Guidance Counsellors however I am happy for the National Executive to meet with officials from the Department to discuss their concerns.
