Quality Assurance

Evaluation within the education system in Ireland is largely operated at a national level. The legal framework for the evaluation of the education system lies in the Education Act 1998 and, in relation to ECEC, in the Child Care Act, 1991 (irishstatutebook.ie)  

The Education Act was the first comprehensive educational legislation in the history of the state and it formalised and provided legislative basis to most of the practices that were in operation prior to its inception.

In accordance with the Education Act 1998, the overarching responsibility with regard to evaluation and assessment in schools rests with the Minister for Education : '......It shall be a function of the Minister…to monitor and assess the quality, economy, efficiency and effectiveness of the education system provided in the State by recognised schools and centres for education …..and to publish, in such manner as the Minister considers appropriate, information relating to such monitoring and assessment. (Section 7/2/b) Under the Child Care Act 1991, responsibility for evaluation and assessment in ECEC services lies with the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth.

On behalf of the Minister for Education, the Department of Education co-ordinates and develops policy and decisions relating to the monitoring and assessment of schools. In so doing, it takes into account advice from the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NCCA) which, in accordance with Section 41 of the Education Act, has a key advisory role in developing mechanisms for assessing standards of knowledge and skills. The Department is centralised and maintains an infrastructure to implement national policy at regional, provincial and local level. Ireland does not have regional or provincial variations in relation to evaluation of the education system. Section thirteen of the Education Act, 1998 outlines the role and functions of the Inspectorate of the Department in relation to the quality assurance of the education system at primary and post-primary level.

Traditionally, evaluation of the education system has been a combination of:

• The work of the Department of Education’s s' Inspectorate;
• Review of the outcomes of the State examinations in post-primary schools;
• Departmental reviews and examinations within the higher education institutions;
• Review or self-evaluation undertaken by individual schools, centres for education, other institutions, and teachers at all levels of the system.
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On behalf of the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth, the Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth (DCEDIY) develops policy and oversees the monitoring and evaluation of ECEC services. Tusla is the Child and Family Agency and is the independent statutory regulator
responsible for the registration, inspection and enforcement of regulations on ECEC services. Tusla’s powers as the independent statutory regulator are set out in the Child Care Act 1991. In addition, at the request of the Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth, education-focused inspections of ECEC services are carried out by the Department of Education Inspectorate.

External evaluation by the Department of Education Inspectorate and by Tusla is one measure that is used in Ireland to help to ensure improvements in the quality of educational provision. The evaluation of primary schools, post-primary schools and centres for education is one of the statutory responsibilities of the Inspectorate under Section 13 of the Education Act 1998. This external evaluation complements other initiatives, such as school self-review, the work of the support services for schools, improvements in curricula, national assessments based on sampling and state examinations. In addition, international post-primary student assessments, statistics on student attendance and participation at all levels are important components of the knowledge base. The Inspectorate also contributes regularly to system evaluation by undertaking evaluation of educational programmes designed to meet particular needs, by participating in Value-for-Money (VFM) reviews and by assessing policy implementation and impact.

In theory, the framework for school assessment is underpinned by both school self-evaluation and external evaluation carried out by the Inspectorate of the Department of Education which in turn complements the self-evaluation processes. In the absence of a policy requirement that schools engage systematically in self-evaluation, external evaluation is in practice the main form of school assessment. Nonetheless, interest in self-evaluation has been growing and the education support services and the Inspectorate actively support it in their work with schools. This is reflected in procedures that are now in place to follow up on inspections and an emerging focus on self-evaluation as part of the inspection process.

In ECEC, the external evaluations carried out by Tusla and by the Department of Education Inspectorate are the primary mechanism for assurance of the quality of ECEC provision. Under  First 5  (the Whole-of-Government Strategy for Babies, Young Children and their Families), as part of the First 5 Implementation Plan 2023-25, the Irish Government has committed to develop a single, integrated quality framework for early learning and care (ELC) to replace the Síolta national quality framework and the two existing inspection frameworks and to be used as the common reference framework for all inspection activities and for self-evaluation by ELC settings. This quality framework will integrate both structural and process quality, and will support providers to assess and enhance their own performance and service delivery along the quality spectrum, from regulatory compliance to excellence.

Through First 5, the Government has also committed to bring together the functions carried out by Tusla’s Early Years Inspectorate and the Department of Education (DE) Inspectorate’s Early Years team into a single body that provides integrated care and education inspections. The work of the new integrated body will be underpinned by the development of the planned single quality framework for ELC.