Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 31 May 2016
330. Deputy Thomas P. Broughan asked the Minister for Education and Skills to provide details on the increased funding required to restore guidance counselling to secondary schools as provided for in the programme for Government; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [13425/16]
View answerThe Programme for Government 'A Programme for a Partnership Government' has a commitment to enhance the guidance counsellor allocation in our secondary schools.
The current budget provides an improved staffing allocation to second level schools for the purpose of enhancing guidance provision. This improvement takes effect from next September. It brings the basis of allocation from 19:1 to 18.7:1 for the 2016/17 school year. This improvement of 0.3 in PTR allocation is a restoration of 50% of the teaching resources that were removed when the allocation of guidance posts was brought within quota.
Restoring the guidance counsellor allocation to 100% will require an additional 300 teaching posts at an estimated cost of €19m per annum.
The delivery of the 50% restoration through a change in the staffing schedule will allow each school to determine how best to allocate the additional resources to meet the guidance needs of the school. The circular issued earlier this year by my Department outlining the allocation of teaching resources clearly stated that this additional resource is to complement existing resources in order to best meet the guidance needs of the school in line with the school's guidance plan.
It is important to note that in previous changes to guidance counselling allocations in 2012, as a consequence of the Budget adjustment which had to be made at the time, all 195 DEIS schools were effectively sheltered from these changes as a result of the more favourable staffing schedule of 18.25:1. This was a 0.75 point improvement compared to the current PTR of 19:1 that applies in non-fee-paying second-level schools.
That was a very important protection for the cohort of our schools in DEIS most in need of support. DEIS schools will also further benefit from the 0.3 improvement to the staffing schedule which will give them an enhanced allocation on the basis of 17.95:1 in respect of the 2016/17 school year.
In the next Budget I will consider the best approach to further meeting commitments in the Programme for Government.
