Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 26 October 2023
179. Deputy Brendan Smith asked the Minister for Education if financial support is available from her Department to improve educational services at a school (details supplied); and if she will make a statement on the matter. [47104/23]
View answerThe Department operates the Schools Broadband Programme at an annual cost of some €13m, providing connectivity to recognised primary, special and post-primary schools through a range of technologies at the best level of connectivity available based on local infrastructure. The Department is obliged to adhere to procurement regulations and must engage with the selected providers on the DoE framework of providers of broadband services through a tender process to award services. This is the basis on which all state-funding is utilised to ensure transparency and equal treatment for all schools and providers, and adherence to regulatory requirements.
It is important to note that where broadband infrastructure is upgraded across the country and where this upgrade will facilitate faster speeds to a school, every effort is made to ensure that the school can avail of this upgrade as soon as possible, either with their existing provider, or through a change to another provider on our framework within the regulatory parameters applying.
The delivery of high quality internet connectivity for all schools is a key objective of my Department. It is accepted that good connectivity is essential to ensure that schools are facilitated to progress the embedding of digital technologies in teaching and learning and for the implementation of new and revised curriculum.
All Schools Broadband wireless services currently provided by this department through the Schools Broadband Programme are on a dedicated service and therefore, if the school referred to but not named by the Deputy is currently experiencing issues with their Schools Broadband connection, in the first instance, they should make contact with the Schools Broadband Service Desk on 1800334466 to log a fault on the loss or degradation of the broadband service to the school, which will be investigated immediately by the service desk team.
Additionally, as you may be aware, the National Broadband Plan Intervention Area (NBP IA) implementation is underway and my Department is engaging with the Department of Environment, Climate and Communications to prioritise school connectivity for those schools in the NBP IA , with the majority of schools to be provided with high speed broadband infrastructure by the end of 2023.
My Department is also concluding a project as part of Ireland's National Recovery and Resilience Plan supported by the NextGenerationEU Recovery and Resilience Facility, to provide high speed connectivity to schools outside of the National Broadband Plan Intervention area, and where commercial provision will not provide such connectivity. It is anticipated that all primary and special schools in the Schools Broadband Programme will be on high speed broadband by the end of 2023/early 2024, with the majority on that level of service currently.
It is not clear from the question if the school the Deputy has tabled this question regarding but not named, is currently part of the School Broadband Programme, so the school is advised to contact the service desk to ascertain whether higher speed connectivity is available for them, and if not, when it will become available through the Programme should they wish to be included.
