Secondary school enrolment “crisis”

BrianD3

There should be uproar over this but there won't be because, so far, it affects a minority of people, none of them "important" or connected. Once the GAA players, children of teacher/politicians and special interest groups are looked after, there still should be enough school places for most people and there will be apathetic attitudes about those who lose out.

Re: people applying to multiple schools, it's a rational response by individuals to a broken system. It's like people booking their NCT months in advance because if they leave it close to the date, they won't get a slot because they'll all be filled by people who booked months in advance.

And education is a helluva lot more important to people's lives than doing their NCT on time is.

Ezeoul

Providing new schools is only part of the problem. The second part is finding the teachers to staff them.

From what I've read, every school, on every level, seems to have vacancies and are finding it extremely difficult to recruit qualified staff - especially in Dublin and it is down to the accommodation crisis and the cost of living.

It feels like everything circles back to that.

eightieschewbaccy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121732374#Comment_121732374

No appointment clinics are fine if you don't have any preexisting medical issues. But to use an example, I moved to my locality back in 2021 and struggled to find any doctor. I managed to get one because I'm single. I've got more than one preexisting condition so having easy access to a GP is hugely important. Eg there was a phase last year where I had to effectively go to GP on a weekly basis. So a walk-in clinic isn't a realistic option for anyone with preexisting conditions.

eightieschewbaccy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121733789#Comment_121733789

Oh I totally get why doctors aren't willing to setup practices and teachers are going abroad. We need to incentivise to make it more appealing. Blaming it on migration into the country is obfuscating the issue. My point was more that walk in clinics are not helpful in a lot of cases.

Gatling

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121733486#Comment_121733486

But it's only getting worse competition for housing is increasing across the country, rapidly increasing the population isn't helping every sector is facing one crisis or another and nobody seems to be steering the ship

Qaanaaq

Well this is all very predictable, If you remember A number of years ago , there was a huge shortage in primary school places and we were reading the same stories all over the country.

But since then , there has been a huge amount of additional primary schools sprouting up all over the place.

Now , that generation of children is at secondary school age , so the problem has now shifted on to secondary school places.

So what will now happen is that in the next decade or so, extra secondary schools will eventually be built, but by then the demographics will have changed. And there will be less people in that age group looking for places .

Sunny Disposition

The Tanaiste made the suggestion that postgraduate teaching courses be cut from two years duration to one. That would be a step in the right direction. So expect the duration to increase to three years!

arctictree

I thought it was illegal not to send your child to secondary school? So what happens if they don't have a place?

Gatling

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121736356#Comment_121736356

No you can Home school either from primary or secondary ,,

The Burke family of castlebar were all homeschooled

Anaki r2d2

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121732982#Comment_121732982

Yip, blame the parents. Parents of “Johny” apply to every school they can because if they don’t they might end up with no school.

heaven forbid there might be an enrolment system in place to ensure that places are not left hanging. Perhaps copy the system in place in Northern Ireland.

Edited. Stupid phone auto correcting typed words for nonsense

Gatling

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121736407#Comment_121736407

Limerick has a decent one ,

Anaki r2d2

Foley stikes again. her first point is blame the parents, her second point talks about sync of entrance exams. Since when do Irish public secondary have entrance exams as part of enrolment?

https://www.rte.ie/news/ireland/2024/0207/1430989-school-places/

Big Bag of Chips

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121736546#Comment_121736546

My eldest brother is 50 this year I remember him doing his entrance exam. All entrance exams in this area are held on the same day. A child can only attend one.

batman_oh

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121733789#Comment_121733789

So the evil racist Irish on boards are scaring the doctors and teachers away? That's an amazing fantasy

L.Ball

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121732429#Comment_121732429

Yeah then we'd have agency workers standing around doing f*ck all in schools as well.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121736546#Comment_121736546

since I was in school anyway. It was designed to test your basic aptitude afaik and effectively help the school decide what level of class you be assigned for each subject. Eg foundation, ordinary level, higher level.

SuperBowserWorld

Even at this point in time, AI (ChatGPT) could provide a tailored 1-1, 24/7, anywhere, anyplace 2nd level education for most subjects, except the practical ones. Plus it would be infinitely patient and allow the student to take the own personal line of questioning and really dig into the meat of a subject.

But it would cause a lot of mental health issues.

Like Social Media does.

Edit ...

But with the right amount it could be very useful, especially for kids that go to bad schools with bad teachers.

Ezeoul

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121736546#Comment_121736546

I remember having to do an entrance exam for secondary school. That's not a new thing.

TheValeyard

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121736984#Comment_121736984

A lot of school entrance exams are really literacy, numeracy, etc tests. Used to help identity students who may need additional help, organise class groups, etc.

political analyst

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121732429#Comment_121732429

That requirement applies to primary-school teaching because that job includes the teaching of Irish.

Boggles

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121736407#Comment_121736407

Well no, I pointed to the problem with the parents and the schools.

But overall I blamed the CCs.

scottser

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121731973#Comment_121731973

It's actually poor planning and leadership from successive FG/FF governments that's to blame, but you carry on trying to stuff your square pegs into those round holes.

timmyntc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121738766#Comment_121738766

130k new people will undoubtedly put extra strain on the system. Unclear what number of those are secondary school aged but a sizeable number at least are. There is a finite number of school places available, so it is total nonsense to dismiss it as a factor.

Head in the sand stuff

Ezeoul

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121737015#Comment_121737015

Which makes perfect sense, to me anyway.

Sunny Disposition

Unfortunately immigration is a related issue, there has been savage population growth since the passing of the Nice Treaty. I doubt there's a secondary school in the country without kids whose parents arrived here in the years afterwards. But it's still on the Government, it pursued a liberal policy on immigration in those years, and didn't put in place the infrastructure to deal with hundreds of thousands of immigrants. As a result we are now playing catch-up in all sorts of services rather than preparing for the arrival of hundreds of thousands more who will have arrived by 2030, given our current policies.

Caoimhe2010

Where I live there are 5 secondary schools which sounds great but 2 are single sex and 1 is Gaelscoil - so for my son we had 4 we could apply for and only got offered 1 (on huge waiting list for the other 3 and never got offered a place) All the schools have their own independent lotteries (if not from feeder school or sibling) so you could end up with no offers if unlucky. We have several towns nearby with no secondary schools so they also are applying to the 5 secondary schools. In recent years we have had 2 new primary schools built which is great but they are full (one has 7 junior infants classes!)so where are these kids going to go for Secondary if it's difficult to get places now! Any new Primary being built should be done at the same time as a significant expansion of an existing Secondary or the building of a new one

Boggles

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121738783#Comment_121738783

More than 13,700 Ukrainian pupils have been enrolled in schools across Ireland since the Russian invasion last February. Most – some 8,800 – are in primary schools, with 4,900 pupils in post-primary schools.

Department surveys indicate there are about 54,000 spare school places at primary level and 20,000 at second level.

Sunny Disposition

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121739106#Comment_121739106

A good idea, but that would require a little bit of foresight, of which we have none.

I was talking to a national school principal this week. He's been trying to get a new school building for the last ten years. They have approval in principle for a couple of years now, but he's still not sure if ground will actually be broken in 2024. The State can't do anything right.