Parents to be surveyed on school ethos, gender mix and education through Irish or English

Parents will shortly be invited to complete a national survey organised by the Department of Education on their preferred ethos of school as part of Government efforts to change more Catholic schools to multidenominational patronage.
Some 88 per cent of primary schools are Catholic while just more than 5 per cent are multidenominational. The remaining 6 per cent are Church of Ireland schools.
The online poll is expected to be open to parents of preschool and primary school-aged children, as well as younger children who have yet to enter the education system, according to education partners briefed on the plans.
The poll will also ask parents about their school preferences in terms of gender mix and language of instruction: Irish or English.
It is understood parents will be asked to provide details of their Eircode and, potentially, PPS numbers to help identify the location of their local school and validate votes.
It is unclear, however, how parental preferences will translate into changes on the ground.
Attempts to divest or reconfigure Catholic primary schools have proved slow and divisive to date with just 15 schools changing from a religious to multidenominational ethos over the past decade or more.
Minister for Education Norma Foley has previously said the poll will differ from previous efforts, which took place locally, by generating a “national conversation” on the issue.
Another obstacle to divestment cited in recent years has been a lack of knowledge among parents over how their school would change under a multidenominational patron, such as Educate Together or State-based Education and Training Boards.
To help address this, patron bodies have supplied short videos explaining their values and how they teach issues such as religion.
Another barrier to change cited by Catholic groups is a law prohibiting Catholic primary schools from prioritising the enrolment of local children of the same faith.
The Catholic Education Partnership – established as a single voice for Catholic schools – argues that the government’s decision in 2018 to remove the right of Catholic schools to discriminate on the basis of religion in their admission policies is a “discriminatory law, solely directed at Catholics, and no other faiths”.
The group said Catholic parents believe keeping the “status quo” in relation to the patronage of schools is their best option unless they can be guaranteed priority access to a school of their faith.
The Government, meanwhile, looks likely to miss its target of significantly boosting parental choice around primary school ethos.
The Programme for Government commits to improving parental choice by meeting a target of delivering 400 multidenominational primary schools by 2030, about 12 per cent of all primary schools.
There are currently about 170 multidenominational primary schools.
The growth in multidenominational education has come about mostly as a result of newly-established schools rather than reconfiguration.
For example, all 23 newly-established mainstream primary schools that have opened since 2018 have been multidenominational in ethos, spread over various patrons.