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“DON’T BE CRUEL, build our school.”
That was the cry from children, and their parents, yesterday at the gates of Leinster House.
The pupils at the Ballinteer Educate Together have been learning in cramped classrooms at St Tiernan’s Secondary School for over five years, and their parents have had finally had enough.
In some cases, the classrooms for children are almost a quarter of the size it needs to be.
At yesterday’s rain drenched protest outside the Dáil, parents and pupils urged Minister for Education Richard Bruton to commit to making the resources available to build their school and instruct his department to lodge the planning application as soon as possible.
Sean Murray / Twitter"Don't be cruel, give us our school": Children educated in prefabs plead for a school building outside the Dail pic.twitter.com/6gEHL4xE4Q
— Sean Murray (@SeanMJourno) May 30, 2017
Cramped conditions
At present there are nine classes from junior infants to third class comprising about 230 children.
A parents’ group has said the current facilities are inadequate with resource teachers forced to work in the lobby and caretaker equipment being stored in toilets.
Plans have been previously submitted for the construction of a permanent school building beside St Tiernan’s but these plans were rejected due to access concerns.
Updated plans were also submitted but were also refused and there have been suggestions that lands could be purchased by the Department of Education to help with access to the site.
The problems have meant that the permanent plans have stalled with the school now moving to another temporary site at Notre Dame in Churchtown.
The distance between Notre Dame and St Tiernan’s is around 3km.
That school campus will be shared with a secondary school and parents have expressed concerns about space at the new school.
A number of politicians have been acting on behalf of the parents and, in response to a question from Senator Neale Richmond, Education Minister Richard Bruton said the school is a “high priority” for the department.
The minister said the Notre Dame site was purchased by the department and a technical assessment is currently being carried out with regards to how best to accommodate Ballinteer Educate Together.
Bruton added that there is “no doubt” that a new planning application would be submitted to allow for the construction of the permanent school building:
I can assure the Senator, from our point of view, that this is a high priority. We want to facilitate this successful school. We want to complete these processes as quickly as possible but we have to do them in a way that meets the requirements and expectations of pupils for the long term, and that is a very important consideration.
“All we’ve had is promises”
Yulia’s child is in senior infants. She told TheJournal.ie that the aims of the parents were simple: “We’re trying to get our school built.
The last five years we’ve only had promises. That’s not enough. The new school [in Churchtown] is not convenient for all of the parents.
Another parent said that the government was simply “kicking the can down the road in terms of committing to planning and building”:
It is unfair that we all pay our taxes yet we don’t have the basic commodity of a school for our children.
The parents association has been very proactive at taking measures to try to make the government take notice of their plight.
Members told TheJournal.ie: “All we want is a basic timeline of when planning will go in and what’s happening with Notre Dame. We know nothing about Notre Dame and don’t know if we’ll all fit.
We don’t even have a hall for the kids to do PE in if it’s raining. In the winter they just have to stay inside their classrooms.
They added that it was very difficult for teachers to teach in such confined spaces.
Ann Roche has two children in the school. She said that she thought this problem would have been sorted a long time ago.
Roche praised the teachers and staff at the school but said that there was a lot of “miscommunication” from the Department of Education on the matter.
After almost six years we have no school building. My daughter started in 2012 and I thought that by time my son started, in 2014, we’d have a school. Here we are in 2017, and we still have no school.
My daughter is in third class now and I’m worried that she will never enter a school building.
With reporting from Aisling Lawrence and Beth O’Neill
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At least the Catholic Church provides buildings.
@Ian Moloney: time they butted out then.
@Ian Moloney: except they do not. The department builds the schools and then hands them over to the church.
@Tony Stack: The church and the Brits managed very well providing proper buildings before the failed free state with its liberal agenda became involved.
@Ian Moloney: Are you serious? Of five schools in my town (all ‘owned’ by religious orders) three have been completely rebuilt at the expense of the state in the last four to five years (at about 7 million each). Meanwhile a new secondary ET school has been shoved in an unsuitable old building that is not a school building.
It’s like St. Vincent’s, which was built 100% with state money and gifted to an order of nuns as an asset, and will now likely end up belonging to a private healthcare group when the nuns sell off their assets. Are we mugs?
This government is not prioritising the multi-denominational schools that polls show are overwhelmingly what Irish people now want. Not in any way, shape or form. In most parts of the country you can live near several schools and they will ALL be religious and impose faith formation onto children – despite being 100% funded by the state.
Submit acceptable plans so with the correct access etc.. Educate together have done that in Firhouse and a primary and Secondary school are currently being built.
@Anto Curran: The Department owns and submits the plans, then hands over patronage. The patron body has nothing to do with the planning, just the running of a school from whatever premises are allocated. I wish it were otherwise!
My son is now 17 and has always been in leaking prefabs in Rush which are now placed on top of each other due to lack or space. You still have more time to wait.
Talk to super shane Ross ….. can he build it … yes he can
When I was in primary school we were promised a new school to finally get out of the prefabs which always suffered from leaks, bad plumbing and in the winter we even had to wear our coats because the heating was brutal! I’m 24 now, and the new school is only being built this year. This country and the department of education needs to focus more into better standard schools for children.
Is moving to Churchtown still going ahead? I thought that had been cancelled
@Chef Harold: It is, and the Churchtown campus is to be shared with two other schools.
Who are the gov. Going to give the buildings to if it’s not run by the church. See that’s you’re basic problem with educate together.
@ed w: the department of education maybe?
@ed w: You make a good point – the state has spent billions re-building and then gifting school buildings to private religious trusts over recent years. We have no stake in them. It is madness. Like St. Vincent’s Hospital, build 100% by the state, and gifted to the nuns, who will now sell off this asset to a private healthcare group. We are mugs.
Meanwhile the state has ‘no money’ to open the multi-denominational schools they promised to the people who so badly want them.
have your say