No Takers For New Dublin School

Plans to open a new primary school in Dublin's Phoenix Park have had to be scrapped as only a handful of applicants put names forward.

Only 13 pupils applied for a place in pilot scheme school, Scoil Oisin, which was intended to serve the community in and around a new development at the old Phoenix Park racecourse site.

The facility was one of three new schools coming under the patronage of County Dublin Vocational Education Committee.

The Department of Education says pupils who had enrolled in Scoil Oisin will be accommodated in nearby schools. However there were no details on how the Department made such an error in judgement in putting the controversial pilot for vocational schools forward for opening, on which millions of Euros in consultations had been spent.

The school was part of a recent pilot scheme - the brainchild of the outgoing minister for education, Mary Hanafin, who has been essentially demoted in the reshuffle to Minister for Social and Family Affairs.

A spokesman for schools' integration body, Educate Together, said Ms Hanafin's introduction of the pilot was based "on the needs of powerful religious bodies rather than the rights and needs of parents and children".

He went to say the schools were configured to facilitate leaders on the catholic church, and quoted the ability of Church leaders to veto the appointments of teachers if they so wished.

"The critical element of this process is that the parents in the area have had no say in the design or designation of these new schools," he said.

Ms Hanafin blamed a slowdown in apartment building in the vicinity of the area for the decision to postpone this school.

(DW/JM)