Foreword

This publication, Beyond Educational Disadvantage, is being launched almost five years after the National Forum on Educational Disadvantage was held in Drumcondra in July 2002, and provides a valuable opportunity to take stock of what has been achieved during that period. In 2002, there was widespread optimism that the time was ripe and that the will existed in Ireland to “end educational disadvantage” – hence the title of the National Forum Ending Educational Disadvantage. The Programme for Government of June 2002 had contained an explicit commitment to building an inclusive society. It promised to fund early years education and to improve class size for pupils under 9 years of age. Teacher supply would be improved and changes would be implemented which would assist schools in educationally disadvantaged areas to recruit and retain teachers. The government would prioritise the reduction of absenteeism and early school leaving, and committed itself to a second chance guarantee to those “who lost out first time round”.