Sorca Clarke
Question:448. Deputy Sorca Clarke asked the Minister for Education the number of students that will be seeking a first year place in secondary school in County Westmeath. [9915/21]
View answerWednesday, 24 February 2021
Questions (448)
Written answers
As the Deputy will appreciate, it is not possible for my Department to confirm the number of students that will be seeking to enroll in any given post primary school(s) as the question of enrolment in individual schools is the responsibility of the Board of Management on behalf of the school patron and my Department does not hold information in this regard. Parents are entitled to apply to enroll their child in any school and where a school has places available, applications for enrolment should be accepted. When the number of applications exceeds the number of places available at the school, the selection criteria as included in the school’s published admission policy will apply.
I would however, like to draw the Deputy's attention to my Department’s website, www.education.ie where data on primary and post primary schools across the country is available under the “Find a School” function. Schools can be searched for using a number of different criteria including, inter alia, School Level, Geographical Area and Ethos and key information on the relevant schools, including enrolments from the 2019/20 academic year, is displayed in the results. A map of the relevant schools is provided as part of the "Find a School" functionality.
Full lists of all schools at primary or post primary level can also be downloaded from the website and these provide further data on individual schools. These lists can be filtered by local authority and/or county which may be helpful.
Information in respect of the 2020/21 academic year is due to be published shortly.
Notwithstanding the effect of parental choice of school and transfer patterns in and out of any given area, in respect of enrolments to post primary schools in County Westmeath for the 2021/2022 academic year, the cohort of pupils in fifth class in primary schools in the county in 2019/20 is relevant, pending publication of the 2020/21 data. I can confirm that there were 1,439 such pupils.
Question No. 449 answered with Question No. 447.