The government has finally abandoned their plan to spend \u20ac9m on phone pouches for schools but are still refusing to give schools autonomy over how the money is spent, according to Social Democrats Education spokesperson Jen Cummins.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn the D\u00e1il today, the T\u00e1naiste announced a screeching government u-turn. Instead of their much vaunted plan to spend \u20ac9m on phone pouches for schools, schools will now have autonomy to apply for funding and use it for their preferred \u2018phone storage solution\u2019.<\/p>\n
\u201cGiven phone pouches can be replaced by a teacher putting phones in a cardboard box, and that many schools already have these phone storage solutions in place, the T\u00e1naiste must now clarify if this money is being ringfenced for phone storage alone.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf that is the case, it just means that a diluted version of the former minister\u2019s pet project is continuing, with the government trying to save face by giving schools an illusion of autonomy.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe reality for schools is that many of them are so cash-strapped that they are struggling to keep the lights on. A new survey today has revealed that a record number have had to apply to the Department for emergency funding.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn that context, it is completely tone-deaf for the government to insist that \u20ac9m should go on phone storage. Everyone agrees that phones should not be used during the school day, but most schools have already dealt with this as an issue.<\/p>\n
\u201cGiven this \u20ac9m fund is going to be retained, there should be much more leeway for schools to apply to fund programmes, and equipment, that they really need.\u201d<\/p>\n
June 12th, 2025<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The government has finally abandoned their plan to spend \u20ac9m on phone pouches for schools but are still refusing to give schools autonomy over how the money is spent, according to Social Democrats Education spokesperson Jen Cummins. \u201cIn the D\u00e1il today, the T\u00e1naiste announced a screeching government u-turn. Instead of their much vaunted plan to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":11586,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[218,581,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12714","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-education","category-jen-cummins","category-press-release"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n