merrion street

Children & Youth Affairs Minister Frances Fitzgerald today launched "Life as a Child and Young Person in Ireland: Report of a National Consultation".

This consultation was conducted in April 2011 and was completed by children and young people across the State.

Minister Fitzgerald said:

This report documents the views of 66,705 children and young people and is the biggest public consultation with children and young people ever conducted in Ireland. The last time such a consultation took place, back in 1999, ahead of preparations for the National Children's Strategy, there were only 825 responses from children and young people. More remarkably, I note that there are over 4,000 schools in Ireland, and some 38% of these participated in the consultation.

Watch the MerrionStreet.ie video from the launch...

Responding to the Report findings, Minister Fitzgerald stated:

The findings of this consultation provide an interesting insight into contemporary Irish childhood and youth.

Education emerged a key issue in the consultation with children and young people expressing satisfaction with the Irish education sytem. However 22% of childrena nd 27% of young people also indicated that they would like to change some aspect of the education system. In particular, young people highlighting concerns such as the need for a greater emphasis on science facilities and better use of technology in schools.

The Minister stated

The fact that our tech-savvy young people can identify concerns in this regard should lend a focus to the Government's ongoing efforts to realise the vision for 21st Century Schools set out in the Programme for Government; a vision which proposes that technology in education should no longer be considered as a stand alone element but instead should be integrated across education policy. The findings of this consultation will inform development of the new Children and Young People's Policy Framework which is currently being prepared by my Department.

The new Policy Framework will represent a dynamic and forward-looking Government Strategy for Ireland's Children and Young People.

The Minister added that

the views of the nearly 67,000 children and young people who engaged in this consultation will help shape this Framework.

Professor Catherin Comiskey from Trinity College Dublin said:

the response rate was enormous with responses from every county in Ireland. 38% of all schools in the country took part, compared witha n expected response rate of 10%, which is the international norm for such consultations. It was agreed that the views of all 66, 705 children and young people should be included and our team in TCD came up with a mechanism for analysing all consultation forms.