Schools still turning to charity for help

SCHOOLS countrywide are struggling to get additional psychological assessments for pupils once they reach their quota of two assessments per annum, the Labour Party claimed yesterday.

School principals continue to turn to St Vincent de Paul for funding when they have used their allocation of two assessments for every 100 pupils, according to Labour’s Jan O’Sullivan.

She said the quota operated by the National Educational Psychological Service (NEPS) was causing unnecessary stress in schools where there are sometimes 20 children in urgent need of psychological assessments.

In December, the Irish Examiner revealed that in excess of 1,000 children had received funding for psychological assessments from St Vincent de Paul, in 2006, at a cost to the charity of over €150,000.

Yesterday, during Dáil questions, the Minister for Education Mary Hanafin insisted that schools could obtain additional psychological assessments when they reach their two assessment quota.

She told the Dáil that the number of psychologists employed by the Department of Education would rise to 209 by the end of 2009, exceeding a pledge to provide 184 psychologists.

A meeting between the department and St Vincent de Paul is due to take place shortly in an effort to establish if schools are seeking the charity’s funding as a “first or last resort”, the minister said yesterday.

“More than 4,000 private assessments were funded in the 2005-2006 academic year. In addition, NEPS psychologists themselves carried out 6,700 assessments. So, in total, nearly 11,000 children had assessments paid for by my Department last year,” she said.

“Given that 11,000 assessments were provided, I was concerned to hear that the St Vincent De Paul had also paid for some. My Department has contacted the society to ascertain why this was the case.”

According to a review completed by the charity last year, psychological assessments have been paid for in a range of locations including Sligo, Letterkenny, Dundalk, Cavan, Navan, Carlingford and Cork.

This is despite the existence of NEPS, established in 1999 with the task of providing every primary and post-primary school with psychological services within five years.