Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 18 January 2024
188. Deputy Paul Kehoe asked the Minister for Education if all refugee children have the same access to additional services in the education system as Irish citizens, that is, NEPS, and so on; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [2281/24]
View answerAll children and young people up to the age of 18 years irrespective of status, including migrant children, children of international protection applicants, refugees, migrant workers and unaccompanied minors have access to free primary and post-primary education in the same way as Irish nationals. A school must admit all students applying where it is not oversubscribed and places are available. Schools must also state within their admission policy that they will not discriminate in their admission on any of nine specified grounds, including race and religion.
All parents have the right to choose which school to apply to, and parents with children of school-going age arriving in Ireland are free to contact schools directly to enrol their child/children. Where local pressure points for school places arise for newly arrived children, the Department works with the Regional Education and Language Teams (REALT) to put necessary arrangements in place to secure school places.
The Statement of Strategy 2023–2025 sets out my Department’s vision for an education system where every child and young person feels valued and is actively supported and nurtured to reach their full potential. The central goals of the strategy include providing high-quality education and a learning experience that meets the needs of all children and young people, ensuring equity of opportunity in education and ensuring that our education system welcomes all children and young people irrespective of their background or ability.
The Migrant Integration Strategy was published in 2017 and sets out the Government’s commitment to the promotion of migrant integration as a key part of Ireland’s renewal and as an underpinning principle of Irish society. The Strategy provides a framework for a range of actions to support migrants to participate fully in Irish life; these actions are designed to support the integration process, as well as to identify and address any remaining barriers to integration.
A key element of the Strategy’s vision was for migrants, and particularly their children, to benefit fully from the education system. Education-related actions included enactment of the Education (Admission to Schools) Bill 2016, and to keep the adequacy of language supports in schools under review continue to be progressed and our engagement with the Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth (DCEDIY) who have responsibility for the Strategy.
My Department provides a wide range of supports to all schools, DEIS and non-DEIS, such as access to supports of the National Educational Psychological Service (NEPS) to support the inclusion of all students and address barriers to students achieving their potential.
Supplementing the universal supports available to all schools, the Delivering Equality of Opportunity in Schools (DEIS) Programme is a key policy initiative of my Department to address concentrated educational disadvantage at school level in a targeted and equitable way across the primary and post-primary sector. In March last year, I announced the single largest expansion of the DEIS programme. This benefited 361 schools. The programme now includes over 1,200 schools and supports approximately 240,000 students. This means 1 in 4 of all students enrolled in schools are now supported in the programme.
