New arrangements have been announced for the patronage of 40 new schools due to be established over the next six years.
The schools are being built to meet a surge in the birth rate, which is forecast to result in an additional 70,000 students at both primary and secondary school level.
Of the 40 schools, 17 will be in the Dublin area and 12 in the commuter-belt regions of Wicklow, Kildare, Meath and Louth. A further six schools will be established in Cork, three in Galway and one each in Wexford and Cavan.
Patron bodies will be invited to apply to the department and provide lists of parents who indicate interest in having their children educated in new schools.
Minister for Education Ruairí Quinn said the new process will be more open and transparent than before and create more choice for parents.
"Parental preferences should be at the heart of considerations about the type of school to be recognised," Mr Quinn said. "The new arrangements will provide that patron bodies proposing schools at either primary or secondary level will be asked to provide evidence of demand."
The schools will cost around €380 million to build and some are due to be delivered using public-private partnerships. There will also be school extension projects to cater for the growing school-going population.
Mr Quinn also announced a group which will advise him on the patronage of new schools, to be known as the New Schools Establishment Group.
It will be chaired by Dr Seamus McGuinness, a retired senior lecturer at Trinity College Dublin's education department, and includes Sylda Langford, former director of the Office for the Minister for Children and Prof Sean O Riain at the sociology department at NUI Maynooth.
