Seán Power
Ceist:130 Mr. Power asked the Minister for Education and Science the action, if any, taken to improve school attendance; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [9346/99]
Written Answers. - Early School Leavers.
My Department has a range of programmes in place to help prevent early school leaving. These include the allocation of additional staffing and funding resources to schools in disadvantaged areas; the Breaking the Cycle of Disadvantage pilot project; the home-school-community liaison service; and the eight to 15 year old early school leavers initiative.
I recently announced a major £57 million package to tackle educational disadvantage across the education system. This plan included the allocation of extra teaching resources to facilitate the extension of the remedial teaching service to all first and second level schools and the extension of the home-school-community liaison service to all first and second level schools with disadvantaged status. These extensions of service will take effect from September next.
In addition, £3.68 million is being committed to the eight to 15 year old early school leavers initiative over the two school years 1998-99 and 1999-2000. The key objective of this initiative is to test models of response to the problem of early school leaving in selected urban and rural areas of disadvantage, with a view to the integration of such models, after structured evaluation, into mainstream policy and practice.
The forthcoming Education (Welfare) Bill, which is currently undergoing detailed drafting and will be published shortly, will provide for the introduction of a comprehensive school attendance service. The legislation will also include specific measures for the early identification and support of children who have dropped out or are at risk of dropping out of the school system.