School takes to field in protest over recognition

Fifty pupils at a Co Clare school were yesterday morning taught in a field in protest at the failure of Minister for Education Mary Hanafin to officially recognise the school.

Teachers and parents of children attending Mol an Óige Steiner school in Ennistymon and Raheen Wood Steiner school in east Clare had anticipated that Ms Hanafin would have made a decision on the schools' status before the start of the new school year.

Both schools lodged their applications last year and it is understood that the department's New Schools Advisory Committee (NSAC) has recommended the two schools for official status.

Securing official status would eliminate the need for the schools to charge fees and raise funds, while it would also place the schools in the department's building programme.

At Mol an Óige, parents pay €35 per child per week, with a sliding scale for additional children, and the school anticipates that it will have to raise €35,000 this year to keep the school open.

However, with no answer from the Minister, the teachers and students of Mol an Óige, on their second day back, took their chairs and blackboards to the site in Ennistymon where the school has been granted permission for a new building.

Mary Joyce, vice-principal of the nearby Ennistymon Vocational School and mother of one boy going to Mol an Óige, said: "I think it is very disappointing that a positive decision has not been made. The school and the committee have done everything possible. They have followed due process and still there is no answer.

"There has been two years of negotiations with this and yet, at a stroke of a pen, the department can open a school in Balbriggan just like that.

"Is this marginalisation of a rural community just because we are in a rural area opening a multi-denominational school?

"I would urge Minister Hanafin to take a decision on the situation and realise it is a group of ordinary people in the west of Ireland wanting multi-denominational co-ed education for their kids, following the national curriculum and using Steiner methods with excellent, committed teachers. It is not anything weird or revolutionary."

Denise Gill, a parent of two children attending the school, said: "My kids love it. My four older boys went through the State school system, but these boys in the Steiner school are so much happier at their age"

Steiner schools have their own distinctive curriculum and teaching method for pupils up to 18. This curriculum is based on a pedagogical philosophy that places emphasis on the whole development of the child, including a child's spiritual, physical and moral well-being as well as academic progress.

Local Fianna Fáil TD Timmy Dooley visited the Ennistymon site yesterday. "I believe that the school has a very, very good case to be granted State recognition," he said, "and I hope that the department would move quickly and make a decision.

Founding teacher Una Ní Ghairbhith asked yesterday: "Why isn't there a decision? And why aren't our children being looked after in a school with the resources and with the staff that is provided to other children in the country? "What the parents find really frustrating is that you go through the process, you meet the criteria, you get recommended by the NSAC and then there isn't a decision."