Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 22 January 2026
356. Deputy Naoise Ó Cearúil asked the Minister for Education and Youth the level of engagement her Department has had with the boards of management of secondary schools in areas of Kildare north regarding enrolment pressures for September 2026 (details supplied); and if she will make a statement on the matter. [5137/26]
View answer357. Deputy Naoise Ó Cearúil asked the Minister for Education and Youth the long-term plan to address sustained enrolment pressure in Celbridge and Maynooth; the projected demand for secondary school places over the next five years; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [5138/26]
View answerI propose to take Questions Nos. 356 and 357 together.
I wish to advise the Deputy that requirement for school places is kept under on-going review in the context of available information on population, enrolments and residential development activity.
The projected peak year for post primary enrolments in the Celbridge school planning area is 2026 and enrolments are projected to decrease thereafter. Post-primary enrolments in the Maynooth school planning area are projected to increase slightly to a projected peak in 2030.
I can assure the Deputy that the provision of school places to meet the needs of children and young people at primary and post primary level, including children and young people with special educational needs is an absolute priority of mine.
Since 2020, my department has invested over €397 million in school infrastructure across County Kildare. The department is continually planning for and investing in existing and new schools to ensure that every child in the State has access to a school place.
The current status of all projects is set out under item number ten at the following link (www.gov.ie). This is updated on a regular basis to reflect project progress through the various stages of capital appraisal, site acquisition, design, tender and construction.
The Department has put in place a number of measures to support parents and post-primary schools, including in North Kildare school planning areas, with a view to helping the admissions process for 2026/27 run as smoothly as possible.
Firstly, the Department has written to all parents and guardians of children in sixth class with advice and guidance regarding the admissions process for post-primary for the 2026/27 school year. This letter advised parents to apply to multiple schools in areas where there is high demand and requested parents to take steps to avoid holding multiple places.
Secondly, the Department has improved the central Post-Primary On-line Database IT system that schools use to register student enrolments. This is an important improvement and assists schools to manage the enrolment process and provide real-time notification to schools where a new student has accepted a school place in more than one school. This will help identify duplicate enrolments at a very early stage.
Furthermore, the data sharing arrangements that were in place for the 2025/26 admissions process have been put in place again for the 2026/27 admissions process in school planning areas that are experiencing enrolment pressures, including areas in north Kildare, such as Maynooth. The admissions data provided by schools will allow the department to analyse duplicate applications as there can be significant overlap in areas.
The Deputy will appreciate that there can often be significant overlap across areas and schools, and the nature of the admissions processes is quite complex. As a result, there can be multiple iterations, where applicants may accept a place but subsequently be offered and accept a place at a second school, freeing up capacity at the first school accepted.
My department's main responsibility is to ensure that schools in an area can, between them, cater for all pupils seeking school places in the area. The availability of places is a matter for each individual school in the context of their Admissions legislation. In relation to school admissions, it is the responsibility of the managerial authorities of all schools to implement an enrolment policy in accordance with the Education Act, 1998.
As the Deputy will be aware, the Apply to School pilot was introduced to simplify and improve the admissions process for post-primary schools in five pilot areas, including Celbridge. For the first time, this system provides families with a single online application process and introduces synchronised and streamlined timelines for schools to manage admissions and issue offers.
While the Apply to School system facilitates the submission of a common applications system for parents, the individual schools retain responsibility for issuing offers based on these applications in accordance with the Education (Admission to Schools) Act 2018 and their published admissions policy. The Department does not issue offers and does not hold a centralised record of offer outcomes for individual schools.
However, similar to previous years, my department will continue to work closely with patrons and schools in order to ensure that all pupils in the area receive an offer of a school place.
As per the department's analysis of the Kildare North school planning area for the 2024/25 academic year, there were more first year places available than 6th class children and 4.46% of first year places were unfilled.
Overall, in Co. Kildare, across 30 post primary schools, 5.75% of places were unfilled.
I can assure the Deputy that Department officials will continue to actively engage with schools and patrons to ensure that there is appropriate provision for all students across North Kildare for the 2026/2027 school year and into the future.
