Minister Foley announces 2022 Dormant Accounts Funding to provide targeted supports to improve educational outcomes for Traveller and Roma students

Minister for Education Norma Foley today announced details of the 2022 Dormant Accounts Funding to provide targeted supports to tackle education disadvantage for Traveller and Roma students.

Under the 2022 Dormant Accounts Fund Action Plan, the Department of Education received €400,000 to tackle education disadvantage for Traveller and Roma communities and to support attendance, participation and retention among Traveller and Roma learners.

Minister Foley said:

Using this fund, the Department of Education will fund 10 new home-school community liaison (HSCL) coordinator posts in 14 non-DEIS post-primary schools supporting Traveller and Roma students.

Their role will be to work primarily with Traveller and Roma students to improve school attendance, participation, retention, progression and outcomes.

These HSCL coordinators will have access to funding, also from the Dormant Accounts fund, to implement and run initiatives to encourage improvements in school attendance, retention and progression for Traveller and Roma students. Funding is also being used to provide targeted supports to ensure the effectiveness of the HSCL role in working with Traveller and Roma families.

The Department of Education also received €100,000 in 2022 Dormant Accounts Funding specifically to support Traveller and Roma learners as they transition from early learning and care settings to primary school, and from primary to post-primary school and onwards. These transitions are recognised as key milestones in a student’s education continuum, and as stages that present challenges in relation to the retention and attendance of some students, in particular Traveller and Roma students. The fund is to be delivered by Tusla Education Support Services (TESS) to provide support for Traveller and Roma learners, and their families, to ease the transition between these vital stages and encourage greater levels of school attendance, participation and retention.

The Dormant Accounts Acts 2001-2012, together with the Unclaimed Life Assurance Policies Act 2003, provide a framework for the administration of unclaimed accounts in credit institutions (banks, building societies and An Post) and unclaimed life assurance policies in insurance undertakings).

The main purpose of the legislation is to reunite account or policy holders with their funds in credit institutions or insurance undertakings and in this regard, these bodies are required to take steps to identify and contact the owners of dormant accounts and unclaimed life assurance policies.

However, in order to utilise the unused funds the legislation also introduced a scheme for the disbursement of funds that are unlikely to be reclaimed from dormant accounts and unclaimed policies for the purposes of measures to assist:

1. the personal and social development of persons who are economically or socially disadvantaged

2. the educational development of persons who are educationally disadvantaged, or

3. persons with a disability

For full details on 2022 Dormant Accounts Fund: Dormant Accounts Fund: Annual Action Plans and Reports

The following schools will benefit from this initiative.