A study of DEIS, the first nationwide programme to tackle disadvantage in schools, has found a decline in absenteeism in poorer urban classrooms.
The report, entitled 'Learning from the Evaluation of DEIS' , also found a drop in the number of students absent for 20 days or more per year, with figures decreasing from 24.4 % to 20.7.
The study, compiled by the ESRI, comes almost a decade on from the start of the Delivering Equality of Opportunity in Schools initiative (DEIS), launched by the Department of Education in 2005.
It funds catch-up measures for the State's 849 most economically and socially disadvantaged schools, principally at primary level.
The DEIS school programme report found students from rural areas were recorded to have better levels of attendance than those from urban areas.
This week the Government announced a review of eligibility criteria for DEIS funding saying it will re-identify the level of need in schools in light of changes in the school population over the decade since the current batch of schools were chosen.
