Incentives? Let’s start with a school, minister

IT WAS with a mixture of disbelief and disgust that I read Education Minister Noel Dempsey’s recent remarks that he was concerned about the drop-out rate from secondary schools, blaming this on financial pressures facing students from disadvantaged homes.

He went on to say this would only change if you “incentivise study for some people“.

This same man is doing nothing to try to save Greendale Community School in Kilbarrack, Dublin, which faces closure. Surely there can be no greater incentive to study for the young people of Kilbarrack and surrounding neighbourhoods than to keep their school open. Greendale Community School is the only school in the area that offers the Trinity Access Programme.