The community of Galway Educate Together Secondary School (GETSS ) is appealing to the Department of Education to find and acquire a permanent and suitable site that will meet their needs of the school community and the growing population of Galway.
Local representatives including Senator Pauline O’Reilly, Catherine Connolly TD, Senator Ollie Crowe, Senator Seán Kyne and Mairéad Farrell TD attended a meeting with GETSS management and parent representatives on Monday to discuss this pressing issue. They are actively pursuing this with Minister for Education, Norma Foley.
“This is a wonderful school community which has been providing an inclusive education in Galway for the last three years,” Senator Pauline O’ Reilly says.
“The students, parents and staff deserve certainty now about a school building for September and into the future so that they can plan and continue to flourish.”
In June 2022, GETSS will outgrow their current accommodation and the Department of Education has not identified a permanent or interim location for the school.
The school is preparing for their largest intake of students in September 2022, welcoming 72 first year students, as well as introducing their first Transition Year programme, making the lack of certainty around accommodation the most pressing concern for the community.
According to Kim Cunningham-Moorat, Chairperson of the Parents’ and Guardians’ Committee (PGCC ), there is an increasing level of frustration and anxiety amongst parents and guardians of students of GETSS.
“We are requesting transparency and urgent action from the department to ensure that we are provided with information and timelines associated with the delivery of GETSS’ urgent temporary accommodation,” Ms Cunningham-Moorat says.
“The community also needs to be kept informed about the permanent location of our school and its timeline.
“We believe that these are realistic expectations that if met will allow the parents and guardians to support GETSS and our children,” she said.
Galway ETSS is designated by the Department of Education as a 1000-pupil school and is a regional solution to serve students of both the Galway City and Oranmore school planning areas and beyond. Places in this school are highly sought with over 200 applicants for the 2022/2023 school year alone.
The developing voluntary secondary school opened in August 2019 to address the surge in demand for post-primary places in Galway City and Oranmore. Currently situated in Grianach House, Murrough, it is Galway’s first post-primary school under the patronage of Educate Together, reflecting a culmination of years of campaigning by families in Galway.
The school is flourishing despite being in temporary accommodation and being restricted in enrolment numbers. In just three years since opening, a student-centred culture is already firmly embedded. There is a strong focus on 21st Century learning while prioritising wellbeing, resilience, student voice and active citizenship.
It is widely known that there is a surge in demand for places at post-primary level in Galway and this will continue for the foreseeable future, based on the numbers at primary school level within the combined school planning areas, where there are 42 primary schools overall.
The National Planning Framework published by the Government in 2018 envisages that the population of Galway City will increase from its current figure of 80,000 to 120,000 over the next 20 years, with obvious knock-on implications for demand for school places. At this stage, it is understood that all post-primary schools in the Galway City and Oranmore school planning areas are operating at capacity.
Arising from this, it is imperative that immediate action is taken to provide Galway ETSS with the capacity to cater for the impending increase in demand for places in the 2022/2023 school year and subsequent years.
