A Social Report for Ireland Volume II - the NESC Website

children 29Diversity in child care provision is not unusual (Unicef, 2008), but the cost, availabilityand quality of childcare is critical, especially for disadvantaged children. In Ireland,when asked, 60 per cent of parents disagreed with the statement ‘I have access tohigh quality, affordable childcare in my community’ (CSO, 2009: 21). When askedif there was an alternative type of childcare they would like to use, 20 per cent ofhouseholds wanted an alternative type of childcare for their pre-school childrenand 15 per cent wanted an alternative type for their primary school children. Forpre-school children the most common reason for not using an alternative was cost/financial, while for primary school children the most commonly stated reasonswere lack of availability and cost/financial reasons.Educational AchievementThe third component of participation is educational achievement. The UNConvention on the Rights of the Child, Article 29 states that ‘The development ofthe child’s personality, talents and mental and physical abilities to their fullestpotential’ is the challenge to the education system, in the development of children’seducational well-being. The indicators presented here relate to achievement at age15 in reading, mathematics and science.The OECD’s Programme of International Student Assessment (PISA) measures theabilities of 15 year olds. The analysis from the PISA 2006 (published December2007) shows children in Ireland doing very well on reading literacy, placed 5thon the OECD ranking behind Korea, Finland, Canada and New Zealand. Irelandhas also improved its performance on science – now slightly but significantlyabove average, and remains average on mathematics. Finland is the top OECDperformer on science by a long way and is also the top OECD performer onmathematics (OECD, 2007d).In Ireland, there is a strong gradation by social class across the three fields, asillustrated in Figure 6.11. For reading, maths and science pupils in the lowest socialclass category perform considerably less well than those in the highest social classcategory. In relation to reading achievement, Eivers et al., (2005) found that indisadvantaged primary schools up to 30 per cent of pupils have ‘serious readingdifficulties’. An important element of educational performance is the extent towhich education systems can prevent low achieving pupils falling too far belowthe average. A Unicef study (2002) found that the ‘best education systems allowhigh achievers to reach their potential, while at the same time not allowing othersto fall too far behind’.