Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 21 February 2017
204. Deputy Thomas Byrne asked the Minister for Education and Skills if he will be putting in place an independent review mechanism, as was put in place after the initial assessment for DEIS in 2006, to address the concerns of schools that did not qualify for inclusion in DEIS but regarded themselves as having a level of disadvantage which was of a scale sufficient to warrant their inclusion in the programme; and if not, the reason. [8496/17]
View answerThe new DEIS Plan provides for a verification process and any school wishing to seek verification of the information used to assess the level of disadvantage of its pupil cohort may submit an application for same to social_inclusion@education.gov.ie.
A key element of DEIS Plan 2017 Plan is the availability of a new identification process for the assessment of schools for inclusion in DEIS using centrally held CSO and DES data.
The key data sources are the DES Primary Online Database (POD) and Post-Primary Online (PPOD) Databases, and CSO data from the National Census of Population as represented in the Pobal HP Index for Small Areas which is a method of measuring the relative affluence or disadvantage of a particular geographical area. Variables used in the compilation of the HP Index include those related to demographic growth, social class composition and labour market situation. This data is combined with pupil data, anonymised and aggregated to small area, to provide information on the relative level of concentrated disadvantage present in the pupil cohort of individual schools. Further information on the development of the identification process is available in the DEIS Review report which can be found on my Department's website at
http://www.education.ie/en/Schools-Colleges/Services/DEIS-Delivering-Equality-of-Opportunity-in-Schools-/.
In its initial application, the new identification model has identified that there are schools in disadvantaged areas, not previously included in DEIS, whose level of disadvantage is significantly higher than many schools already in the programme. Accordingly, we are moving as a first step to include these schools within the DEIS School Support Programme.
Schools included in the list published by the Department on 13th February are those whose level of concentrated disadvantage has been identified as being at the same level as the current DEIS category for schools serving the highest concentrations of disadvantage.
Schools which have not been included at this stage, are those which have not been identified as having the highest levels of concentrated disadvantage amongst their pupil cohort.
