FINANCIAL incentives apart, there is also the question of how suitable traditional school programmes are for some students it may indeed be that Youthreach or FAS programmes are more suited to their needs.
New programmes in schools such as the Leaving Cert Applied Programme (LCAP) have been designed to cater for less academic students and should help to encourage more young people to stay on in school. A fairly comprehensive revision of the Leaving Cert syllabuses is under way, and the Vocational Preparation and Training Courses (VPTC) are designed to provide more vocationally based training.
One of the most successful local initiatives to encourage young people to remain in education is the Dublin BITE programme (Ballymun Initiative for Third Level Education), which was established in 1990 to encourage pupils from the Ballymun area to stay in the education system and to encourage them to consider third level education.
For many years, the number of young people going on to third level education in Ballymun was very low and the drop out rate in second level was extremely high: four times the national level up to the Inter Cert, as it then was, and twice the national average up to Leaving Cert level. The BITE programme, an initiative of the local community, the Ballymun comprehensive schools and Dublin City University, has done more than anything else to change that situation.
BITE works on a number of levels. At primary level, book "tokens and certificates are presented to the best pupils in each sixth class group in the locality. This year this initiative is being supplemented by the establishment of study centres run by third level student volunteers to encourage younger students to develop homework and study skills.
At second level, in addition to one to one or small group supplementary tuition and supervised study, DCU ensures grants are provided to students at both Junior and Leaving Cert level. Up to 24 Junior Cert students receive grants of £200 per year, while up to 36 Leaving Cert students receive grants of £400 per year.
BITE also organises visits to third level colleges, briefings for parents and students. In addition, financial support is provided for school books funds and remedial teaching.
At third level DCU provides grants worth £960 per year to students from the scheme who have secured a place in a third level college.
Since 1990, BITE has enabled 70 students from the Ballymun area to go on to third level education. DCU is now set to extend the scheme to more schools and an access officer is to be appointed at the college.
Trinity has a similar scheme, called Access, involving schools in disadvantaged areas, and UL also has a scheme. The Minister for Education is set to encourage other colleges to engage in similar programmes.
It still doesn't address the problem of lack of maintenance for students who go to PLC colleges (officially designated as "further" rather than, "higher" education). And it may well be that some form of general financial support scheme for disadvantaged students who wish to remain on in school to Leaving Cert level is required.
"Otherwise," says a guidance counsellor, "there is the temptation to leave school early to take up dead end jobs which offer what seems attractive money in the short term."
