Bishop welcomes common school enrolment policy
- Published: 10 October 2008
By: Gordon Deegan
THE BISHOP of Killaloe has endorsed a common enrolment policy for Ennis primary schools that he believes will avoid the difficulties in other towns where each school caters for a different social class.
The enrolment policy aims to guarantee 25 per cent of all new places for minorities - Travellers, and foreign nationals.
Dr Willie Walsh said he believed the policy was the first of its type in the country and described it as a significant move.
"I'm very happy with it and its purpose is that there will be an equitable distribution of settled Travellers, non-Irish nationals and special needs children in the town's schools," Dr Walsh said.
"What we are trying to avoid are the difficulties that have occurred in other towns where each school caters for a different social class. The new policy ensures that each school caters for a cross-section of children in their areas."
He said school principals and boards of management deserved great credit for the new policy.
The Ennis Education Forum played a key role in devising the policy. Forum documents show that the schools agreed to implement the policy in the knowledge that as the patron, Dr Walsh can disband any board of management and instead appoint a manager to direct the principal.
The minutes of one forum meeting record: "Any schools who may not accept the policy will have to have their admission policy approved by the patron. It was noted that all of the schools present were not 100 per cent satisfied but had compromised for the common good."
It goes on: "The patron has the highest authority and can disband the board of management of any school and can appoint a single manager to direct the principal."
Against the background of increasing numbers of foreign nationals seeking enrolment and schools operating different policies, the common policy is to be introduced for the school year starting next September.
According to the education forum minutes, the policy is the culmination of seven meetings involving a sub-group of chairmen and principals of the schools.
The process has been facilitated by Joe O'Connell of St Senan's education office, Limerick.
The forum documents also say: "The rationale behind the policy is to provide a common enrolment policy for all schools in the Ennis parish, to include Catholic education and a welcome for pupils of other faiths and traditions".
The key features of the policy are a co-ordinated structure for all schools, and common advertising dates, application forms, closing dates and registration sessions.
A review of the new policy will be made in January.
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Minister's decision-making not fully informed - Shatter
- Published: 10 October 2008
Fine Gael
Fine Gael National Press Office Press Release
..................................................................
Leinster House Contact: Alan Shatter TD
Dublin 2 Nick Miller Children's Spokesman
Ireland 086 6992080
Fine Gael Front Bench Children's Spokesman Alan Shatter TD has said very serious questions must be asked about the Department of Education's selection process for including school building projects in the Primary School Building Programme.
"I am very concerned by comments by Education Minister Batt O'Keeffe on 3rd October which make it clear he has relied solely on population projections when choosing the locations for new permanent primary school buildings. He has failed to take into account the number of pupils already attending primary schools which are operating wholly or partially out of prefabs, or the number of new pupils enrolled for 2009 and onwards. Population projections provide useful additional information, but it is a major error to make decisions based on them alone.
"The schools included in the Primary Schools Building Programme announced on 29th September are very unevenly distributed geographically. The reason for this became clear with the Minister's comments on 3rd October regarding the use of a 'state of the art colour coded mapping technology' to help him anticipate where 100,000 new school places will need to be created over the next seven years.
"This week I tabled a Dáil Question to the Minister asking how many children in schools across Dublin South are currently taught in prefabs; whether the prefabs are owned or rented; the costs involved, and the current position regarding the provision of permanent school buildings.
"The Minister's response states that his Department 'does not hold information on the numbers of pupils in individual schools who currently occupy temporary accommodation' and 'does not have a central database of those schools that are currently fully or partially accommodated in temporary or prefabricated accommodation'. With regard to the amount of public money the Department of Education is spending on buying and renting prefabs the Minister states: 'this information is not held in a readily accessible aggregate form for the areas requested'.
"It is clear that not only is the Minister not fully informed, but his Department is so disorganised it cannot access important information that should be used to determine school building priorities and the proper allocation of public funds. The Department information systems are so defective they are relying on school information figures which are 12 months out of date. For example, Holy Trinity National School in Leopardstown has no permanent building. It operates solely out of five prefabs. But with 70 new junior infants enrolled for September 2009 the school will need more prefabs next year. When I raised the predicament of this school in the Dáil this week the Junior Minister, responding on behalf of Education Minister Batt O'Keeffe, quoted attendance numbers for the school which are 12 months out of date.
"Primary school Principals, Boards of Management and Parents' Associations up and down the country are desperately holding public meetings, organising campaigns and lobbying public representatives in an effort to secure permanent school buildings so that children can be taught in proper classrooms in schools which have the facilities to which they are entitled. It is reasonable to expect that decisions made within the Department of Education on which schools get new buildings or extensions should be made on the basis of need by a fully-informed Minister."
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Calls for New Approach to Solve School Building Crisis in West Cork
- Published: 09 October 2008
STATEMENT BY SENATOR MICHAEL MCCARTHY
Labour Party Senator for Cork South-West
Labour Party Senator for Cork South-West, Michael McCarthy, has called on the Government and the Minister for Education & Science, Batt O'Keeffe to adopt a new approach to solve the massive school building crisis in West Cork.
Senator McCarthy said, "There is a need to speed up the process of school building. Clonakilty Gael Scoil has been waiting for over a decade for a new school building. The current school building process is slow and over-bureaucratic. Very few people can actually understand how it works.
"There is a need to drastically overhaul the procedures and to make them more user-friendly. There is also a need to adapt the procedures to suit the specific needs of each school. The requirements of schools can vary greatly depending on location, enrollment numbers and the socio-economic background of its pupils. A "one size fits all" approach has failed. The current economic crisis can present an opportunity for the Government to re-access how it goes about progressing capital projects."
Speaking in the Seanad during a debate on education funding, Senator McCarthy proposed that the Government could guarantee a mortgage that would be taken out by the Boards of Management of some schools. As well as allowing the project to proceed without further delay, it would also provide work for the construction industry in these leaner times.
"The money that is currently being used to rent prefabs and land could then be used to repay the mortgage. Nowhere would this scheme prove more adaptable than at Clonakilty Gael Scoil in Co. Cork. At present €300,000 per annum is being spent on rent while a site for the new school lies idle. It makes no sense for the Government to waste this money on rent when it could be paying for a brand new school.
"This proposal has received the support of Eamon Gilmore who visited the Gael Scoil in Clonakilty last week. I would ask the Minister to look at this proposal and to give it his urgent consideration. It is an effective way to get our much needed schools and to provide jobs for an industry in difficulty."
ENDS.
Contact Senator Michael McCarthy at 087 648 1004 www.labour.ie/press
Audit of education building section urged
- Published: 09 October 2008
By: Seán Flynn
THE COMPTROLLER and Auditor General has been urged to conduct a value-for-money review of the planning and building unit in the Department of Education and Science.
The call has come from Senator Joe O'Toole who claims the operation of the section has become "increasingly illogical and dense''.
Mr O'Toole, a former general secretary of the Irish National Teachers' Organisation, complains about the total lack of transparency in the workings of the unit in a letter to the comptroller.
In detailing the five-stage process in which schools seek new buildings or an extension, he says it is " utterly inefficient and seems calculated to create extraordinary confusion and frustration".
He also complains that new priority lists for building projects replace old ones with a total lack of transparency. "While the lists themselves are clear and simple to read and understand - it is the reasoning behind the list which is not understood by anyone except, apparently, the Minister. No one knows how the Minister decides which schools to add, which schools to drop and which schools to keep on the list. There are no published criteria."
He also claims: schools are unable to get clear and accurate information on the progress of their school building project; there is constant changing of prioritisation without any explanations; and the whole process seems shrouded in secrecy with no transparency.
In all, €600 million in public funding is being provided for the school-building programme this year.
Mr O'Toole says this "massive amount of taxpayers' money is not being used economically or efficiently".
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Angry parents protest at 10-year wait for school
- Published: 09 October 2008
By Sean O'Riordan
HUNDREDS of angry parents, pupils and teachers have protested at an unfulfilled promise made 10 years ago to provide a new school in Co Cork.
Exasperated by cramped conditions at Ballygarvan National School, they protested in support of 48 local children who will have to seek places elsewhere next year.
They are demanding that ex-education minister Micheál Martin fulfil a promise made in 1998 about the development of a new school.
Locals are concerned the proposed building project will remain on the long finger.
Stephen Crowley, spokesman for the Ballygarvan New School Committee, said the school had "maxed out" on the number of prefabs it could fit on its grounds.
"It currently has two full classrooms and eight prefabs accommodating 256 children and 10 teachers on a 0.6 acre site."
Five education ministers have been in office since the promise was made, but parents say they are no nearer a resolution.
"In the intervening 10 years, the school population has increased from 145 to 265 pupils. The staff numbers have increased from five to 10 and the recreation space around the school's 0.6 acre site has decreased considerably to accommodate eight prefabricated classrooms," said Mr Crowley.
Pupils and teachers have to cope with restricted yard space, no indoor PE facilities, no library or IT room and prefabs that are too cold in the winter and too hot in the summer.
The Department of Education has failed to purchase an adjoining 2.7 acre site for the new school, despite agreeing a price 18 months ago.
However, Mr Crowley pointed out: "The department has spent €€580,000 for temporary accommodation at the school between 2003 and 2008."
The Diocese of Cork and Ross has offered to buy the land if the department will commit to building a school.
Parents are bombarding Education Minister Batt O'Keeffe with emails urging him to act now.
Their immediate priority is to ensure the 48 local children left without a place are accommodated in the school next year.
The department is to spend €586 million on the school building programme this year, with a third of that invested in rapidly developing areas around Dublin.
A department spokesman said yesterday Mr O'Keeffe and Bishop John Buckley had been engaged in "positive talks" in the past few days.
"They are making progress and are very near the future acquisition of the site and the school building project. It is hoped more progress will be made in the near future," the spokesman said.
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