INTO:Minister for Education Mary Hanafin has committed a Fianna Fáil-led Government to a doubling in funding for primary pupils and an average of one teacher for every 24 pupils by September 2010.
In her address to the INTO congress, she said the main support for each primary pupil - known as the capitation grant - would double to more than €327. The promise was welcomed by the INTO; it said funding of this nature would help to transform the face of primary education.
At present, most schools have to rely on sponsored walks and other fundraising events in order to meet basic costs like insurance and heating. The increase in the capitation grant, promised by the Minister, would be worth an extra €100,000 to a school with 600 pupils.
Ms Hanafin committed a Fianna Fáil cabinet to the increase in capitation over the lifetime of the next government.
On class size, the main agenda item at the conference, she said 2,000 of the 4,000 new teachers announced by Taoiseach Bertie Ahern at the Fianna Fáil Ardfheis recently would be needed just to manage population increase.
The remaining 2,000 would be targeted towards reducing class size. The teacher allocation schedule would decrease from 26 pupils for each teacher to 24 for one by September 2010.
The new teachers are a response to the INTO's successful campaign on class size. Some 15,000 parents and teachers have attended public meetings on the issue in recent months. The meetings reflected public anger about the Government failing to deliver on promises made on class size in the Programme for Government five years ago. This had promised average class size of 20 and under for all pupils aged under nine by this year.
Aside from the new commitment on the capitation grant, Ms Hanafin did not give any details of Fianna Fáil's education package for the election, which would be published shortly. Instead, she outlined the "huge progress" achieved in the past five years.
With an increase in funding for primary education of 70 per cent since 2002, she said a great deal had been achieved. She listed these as including;
• Thousands of extra primary teachers put in place;
• Supports for children from disadvantaged areas and those with special needs dramatically improved;
• The largest programme of building and renovation is under way;
• €820 million provided for special education this year;
• More than 5,000 teachers in mainstream schools working solely with children with special needs, compared to a fraction of this a few years back;
• Over 1,000 teachers in special schools; and
• In excess of 6,000 primary special needs assistants.
On class size she said: "From the minute I took over as Minister for Education, I have always acknowledged that more needs to be done to reduce class sizes. But I have also been honest about what would be possible within the lifetime of the current Government."
She added that 5,000 extra primary teachers had been put in place since 2002. "And while putting all of those posts into classroom teaching would have done a lot for class size, I still believe that targeting children with special needs and those from disadvantaged areas in the first instance was the right thing to do. It wasn't the political thing to do. It wasn't the easy option but it was the right choice."
On school buildings, she said more than €2.5 billion has been invested in the school building programme in the past five years. "This year we are spending more than five times what was provided in 1997."
