Call for review of child literacy policies

WORK to improve literacy among children in the poorest communities must be constantly reviewed if the €1 billion government spend on educational disadvantage is put to best use, according to the National Economic and Social Forum (NESF).

A major recommendation of the forum’s latest report on child literacy and social inclusion is to focus attention on what chairperson Dr Maureen Gaffney described as the scandal of 30% of children in disadvantaged schools leaving without adequate levels of literacy.

The NESF has studied the implementation of policies in a number of schools in the Department of Education’s programme for tackling disadvantage, Delivering Equality of Opportunity in Schools (DEIS), launched in 2005. Dr Gaffney said many schools were seeing benefits, inspired by the leadership of principals, but that others were not doing as well.