An injustice is being perpetuated by the Department of Education on Galway students and parents of students looking for second level education through Irish, according to Conradh na Gaeilge.
In a letter to the Minister for Education, Batt O’Keeffe, Conradh has asked that funding be provided for a new school for Coláiste na Coiribe and that the school be included in the new PPP bundle due to be rolled out by the Department.
Figures issued by Coláiste na Coiribe show that the school had to refuse places to some 100 children this year due to lack of space in the four buildings the school now occupies on the Tuam Road.
According to a spokesperson for Conradh, this equates to Irish language second level education being refused to 600 students in a full school cycle. The school annual intake can now not exceed 60 students, despite already having an average application list of 145 from now to 2016.
In its letter to the Minister, Conradh says this situation amounts to the “denial of the language and education rights” of the children, in particular those who had already spent eight years attending Gaelscoileanna.
Conradh also said the situation amounted to “a huge waste of state resources” regarding the language when children who had received primary education through Irish were “denied the opportunity to continue their education through Irish at second level”.
