Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 21 April 2021
1085. Deputy Patrick Costello asked the Minister for Education if any of the post-primary schools to open in 2021 will be an Irish-medium school; and if not, her contingency plans to provide for the wishes of those parents who have stated a preference for Irish-medium education. [20651/21]
View answerFour new post-primary school are due to be established in September 2021.
As the Deputy may be aware a patronage process is run after it has been decided, based on demographic analysis, that a new school is required. The patronage process is open to all patron bodies and prospective patrons. It is open to all applicant patrons, where applicable, to propose provision of English or Irish-medium education. Applicant patrons proposing an English-medium school are also required to confirm their commitment to provide an Aonad where there is demand for it. An Online Patronage Process System (OPPS) provides objective information to parents in the relevant school planning areas to assist them in making an informed choice about their preferred model of patronage and also language of instruction for the new school. Parental preferences for each patron, together with the extent of Irish provision, if any, currently available in the area, are key in relation to the outcome of this process. The assessment process analyses existing Irish-medium provision in the area and also takes into account existing Irish-medium provision in the adjacent school planning areas. This assists the consideration in terms of whether a new post-primary school should take the form of a Gaelcholáiste (a post-primary where the language of instruction is Irish), an English-medium school or an English-medium school with an Aonad (Irish-medium Unit).
This process was followed in considering the language of instruction of the four new post-primary schools.
Following the patronage process, the outcome of which was announced in December 2020, in the case of all four schools, there were some parental preferences for Irish-medium education but none of these were considered to be at a level at which would indicate that a Gaelcholáiste should be established. Accordingly, the schools were announced to be English-medium schools.
In one area (Gorey school planning area), demand was low at less than 2%.
In two areas demand was considered relatively low. In the case of one of these schools, that to cater for the Dunshaughlin school planning area, the school patron is to give consideration to the establishment of an Irish-medium Unit (Aonad) when the new school is in its permanent location, if demand from parents indicate that this would be feasible. In the other area (Booterstown_Blackrock and Dún Laoghaire school planning areas) it was considered that the existing provision should be capable of absorbing the level of demand in the short term. Given the number of new Irish-medium gaelscoileanna which have been established in recent years or are due to be established, the Department is keeping the position under review as these schools grow.
Regarding the area where parental preferences as part of the OPPS was considered moderate (Ballincollig school planning area), the Department is satisfied that there is sufficient capacity, and the potential to expand capacity should demand require it, within the existing provision.
The patronage assessment reports, along with the Department's report to the New Schools Establishment Group (NSEG) and the NSEG report to the Minister are available on the Department's website www.education.ie
