DEIS
Launched in 2005 by the Department of Education and Skills, DEIS (Delivering Equality of Opportunity in Schools) is the most recent national programme aimed at addressing the educational needs of children and young people where it is needed most. A very significant element of DEIS is known as the School Support Programme (SSP) which is in place in about 340 urban primary schools, 340 rural primary schools, and 200 post-primary schools with the greatest need for extra support structures addressing many facets of school life.
All primary and post-primary schools participating in DEIS receive a range of additional resources including additional staffing, funding, access to literacy and numeracy programmes, and assistance with activities such as school planning. As part of the SSP, interventions such as the Home School Community Liaison Scheme and the School Completion Programme are available to DEIS post-primary schools.
Schools in the DEIS programme are required to set out a three-year DEIS Action Plan for Improvement. As part of this process, schools are asked to set specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time specific targets and to evaluate these annually by monitoring the impact of actions undertaken in the key DEIS themes.
