New school places are being made available to cope with the crisis in the Dublin 15 area, where up to 200 children have been struggling to gain places next September.
More than 8,000 new homes have been built in the area in recent years but, until yesterday, little extra provision was made for additional school capacity.
Minister for Education Mary Hanafin announced yesterday that Castaheaney Educate Together school would take an additional class of junior infants this September. She has also agreed to grant recognition to a new primary school for the area with effect from September under the patronage of the Catholic Archdiocese of Dublin.
Labour's Joan Burton - who first highlighted the crisis in Dublin 15 - has welcomed the moves. "Finally, after years of campaigning, the Minister has opened her ears and taken a step towards addressing the schools places crisis in Dublin 15," she said. "The rate and pace of development in this area is almost unprecedented and we need to ensure that we have sufficient education infrastructure in place to cater for the ever-increasing number of pupils seeking school places," added Ms Burton.
"The department had anticipated that a further new school would have been required for September 2007 and that the recognition of a new school could have been processed this autumn within the normal school recognition process," Ms Hanafin said. "The greater-than-anticipated population change in the area means we cannot wait and therefore I am taking the exceptional measure of recognising a new school. . ."
Ms Burton said thousands of houses have been built in the area over the past 10 years, and "yet no provision was made to provide an education for the children that moved into the area".
