NONE of five new primary schools opening in the next two years will be under the control of the Catholic Church.
The Department of Education Monday gave the go-ahead for the five schools to open in Dublin's commuter belt in September 2011 and 2012.
The share-out reflects the shifting ground in Ireland's educational landscape, in particular the
diminishing role of the Catholic Church.
The
schools will cater for the fast-growing communities in west Dublin as
well as the burgeoning population of Ashbourne, in neighbouring south
Meath.
Three of the schools will open next September and the other
two in September 2012 -- and all will be either multi-denominational or
inter-denominational.
The multi-denominational body Educate
Together will be patron to three of the schools, in Mulhuddart and west
Blanchardstown in September, and in Ashbourne in 2012.
The Irish
language organisation, An Foras Patrunachta, will be patron of a new
multi-denominational school in Ashbourne in September, and an
inter-denominational school in Mulhuddart in 2012.
In
multi-denominational schools, parents arrange for the teaching of
religion outside school hours, while an inter-denominational school
provides religious teaching for children of more than one denomination
during the school day.
The Catholic Church has been the dominant
force in primary school patronage, controlling 92pc of Ireland's 3,200
primary schools.
The influx of immigrant families since the late
1990s, coupled with a fall-off in the number of practising Catholics,
has created a demand for greater diversity in the education system.