VdeP society confronts educational disadvantage

The St Vincent de Paul Society thinks the Department of Education should introduce a book rental scheme to tackle educational disadvantage.

In a new survey of educational disadvantage, the society also said inadequate social welfare payments was a major obstacle to keeping youngsters in the education system. And the waiting lists for the education psychology service are so long, the society is paying to have thousands of children assessed privately.

The findings of the survey, Learning To Make Do Won't Do, were presented at a conference in Dublin on Saturday. The social policy vice-president, Mr John Monaghan, said the society was spending €2 million a year on tacking educational disadvantage. Up to 4,000 children were being helped by means of subsidising families to allow them to keep their children in school.

The society runs breakfast clubs for children, many of whom would come to class hungry otherwise. And it runs homework clubs for pupils who do not receive adequate assistance in the home.

"We also help people who want to go to college with things like fees, travel expenses, accommodation expenses and basic funds like pocket money, because we find the supports provided by the education system simply are not enough," Mr Monaghan said.

The society's review also concluded parents in disadvantaged areas need support in the shape of parenting skills and improved access to adult education.

"The pupil-teacher ratio must be reduced in disadvantaged areas to ensure that children with difficulties receive more individual attention. There is a need to attract more dedicated and highly-skilled teachers to work in schools in disadvantaged areas and to acknowledge and compensate the teachers for their efforts."

Dr Concepta Conaty, national co-ordinator of the Department of Education's home-school community liaison scheme, told the conference early intervention in the life of an at-risk child was the key.

"The decision to drop out of school is often made at eight years of age. Not because the child decides at that stage he or she is going to leave, but because the internalised motivation is so lacking that the child simply has not got a chance," she said.

"The parent is the prime educator," Dr Conaty said. "Bringing literacy into the home is another key. When someone from a school cares enough to call to a child's home to see the parents, the parents will often shed their own negative experience of school."

The curriculum needed to be adapted to meet the needs of a child and teachers must understand the socio-economic problems facing many families.