Book editors call for health and education to be linked

SCHOOLS must care for children’s health and welfare as well as their education if they are to help poorer pupils escape the poverty trap, an expert warned yesterday.

Dr Ann Louise Gilligan, a lecturer at St Patrick’s College in Dublin, is co-editor of a new book comprehensively examining educational disadvantage. She called for the Government to increase its investment in education to alleviate the deficit faced by children in less well-off backgrounds.

Beyond Educational Disadvantage was published yesterday and highlights many shortcomings in present schemes to alleviate disadvantage, despite increased Government investment and focus on the problem in recent years.