Jen Cummins
Question:296. Deputy Jen Cummins asked the Minister for Education and Youth the reason a school (details supplied) was excluded form DEIS plus.; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [31579/26]
View answerThursday, 30 April 2026
Questions (296)
Written answers
Addressing educational disadvantage and ensuring that every child and young person can reach their full potential is a key priority for me as Minister for Education and Youth and for the Government. The new DEIS Plus scheme, which will commence this year, launched as part of the DEIS Strategy to 2035, represents the most significant expansion of targeted supports since the establishment of DEIS. DEIS Plus is designed to provide enhanced, evidence-based supports to a cohort of 121 schools with the highest concentrations of children and young people at risk of educational disadvantage, identified through a refined data-based model that draws on a range of indicators associated with persistent and intergenerational disadvantage.
This approach ensures that additional resources are directed where they can have the greatest impact, and forms a core element of the wider €48 million full-year investment across both the DEIS Strategy and the DEIS Plus scheme. Approximately 30,000 children and young people attending DEIS Plus schools will benefit from these targeted supports.
Schools in the DEIS Plus scheme will receive strengthened, research-informed supports across wellbeing, attendance, engagement, guidance, leadership capacity, community partnerships and access to services, including the introduction of a new positive mental health and wellbeing initiative to support a whole-school approach to student wellbeing. This targeted enhancement of supports will not result in any dilution of resources for schools that do not meet the criteria for inclusion in the scheme.
It is important to stress that a school not identified through the DEIS Plus model does not in any way imply that the department is saying that disadvantage does not exist within that school community. DEIS Plus schools were identified using a refined, rules-based model built on nationally available pupil-level administrative data. The model draws on a range of indicators associated with persistent and intergenerational disadvantage, including small-area deprivation, lone parenthood and unemployment, Traveller and Roma identity, and children living in State-funded emergency accommodation or international protection accommodation. These indicators are applied consistently across all schools using enrolment data from the past three years.
I also recognise that some schools are operating in the context of complex local pressures within their wider communities. While these challenges are often well understood locally, they are not always captured in datasets that can be fairly and consistently applied across the entire school system. A rules-based national model must consider all schools on the same basis; it cannot substitute locally held knowledge for data that are not available or comparable nationwide.
My department is committed to ensuring that all schools are treated equally and fairly in the manner in which they have been identified for inclusion in the DEIS Plus scheme. Schools that were not satisfied with the outcome following the application of the DEIS Plus identification model to their school enrolment data may appeal that outcome.
Information on the appeal process can be found at the following link: www.gov.ie/en/department-of-education/circulars/deis-plus-scheme-appeal-process/