The minister for Education, Batt O'Keeffe, has agreed to consider whether guidelines should be issued to schools from his Department on how to deal with Muslim pupils who wish to wear the traditional hijab headscarf – and presumably other religious-related symbols - in class where it contradicts school uniform policy. Mr O’Keeffe said the matter would be dealt with in the context of an intercultural education strategy to be published later this year.
He made the remarks after it emerged that his Department had declined to give advice or direction to a County Wexford school on whether it should or should not vary its school uniform policy to facilitate a student wearing a hajib.
In a statement, Mr O'Keeffe said that while individual school authorities were responsible for drawing up school rules, he appreciated that "sensitive issues" can arise given students' different cultural and religious backgrounds.
The principal of Gorey Community School, Mr Nicholas Sweetman, had written twice to the Department of Education late last year seeking guidance when a Muslim couple requested that their child be allowed wear a hijab in class.
But the Department declined to give the school any official ruling on the matter and said the issue was a matter for the school’s board of management.
It told the school that "it would not be appropriate for the Department to direct or advise a school in relation to any aspect of its policy on dress code".
And it pointed to the duties of boards of management to uphold the "characteristic spirit of the school" as determined by the cultural, educational, moral, religious, social, linguistic and spiritual values which inform and characterise it and at the same time to "have respect and promote respect for the diversity of values, beliefs, traditions, languages and ways of life in society".
Mr Sweetman said this left the school in an unsatisfactory situation and he believed that the Department should have a policy on the wearing of religious-related dress in schools.
"As a State school, the State should be offering guidance so that we don't have a situation where in this school the child is allowed to wear the hajib, and another school down the road will say, 'We don't allow that'," he said.
"It's fine for me to say as principal of this school that it's grand for a girl to wear a hijab here, but supposing a child comes wanting to wear the full veil” Mr Sweetman continued.
“Do I say yes or do I say no? And why do I say yes or no?" he asked.
The Gorey principal was supported by the general secretary of the Association of Secondary Teachers in Ireland, Mr John White, who said the Department should now formulate a policy on the headscarf.
"At this stage, (the Department) can't wash their hands of it, and perhaps we do need a consensus in all schools," he suggested.
A hajib is a square of fabric folded into a triangle, placed over the head and usually fastened under the chin.
It is less conspicuous than more elaborate head-coverings worn in some traditionalist Muslim societies, such as the chador and the burqa.
There has previously been controversies – which have never been conclusively resolved - over whether female Muslim medical students in Irish hospitals should be allowed wear a hijab during surgery and whether Sikh recruits to the Garda Siochana should be allowed wear turbans instead of the official uniform cap.
In 2006, the French government sparked outrage when it banned the use of the hajib and other religious symbols such as Sikh turbans, Jewish skullcaps and large Christian crucifixes from state schools.
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