Emer Higgins (Dublin Mid West, Fine Gael)
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74. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills if the Department site at St. Finian’s National School, Newcastle, County Dublin, is big enough to accommodate a post primary school or school campus that offers post primary education. [8226/24]

Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail)
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The site in the Minister's ownership, adjacent to St. Finian’s National School, Newcastle, Co. Dublin extends to 2.1 Hectares (5.2 acres).

My Department has published guidelines to assist in the identification and the assessment for suitability of new sites for schools where the procurement of a new site is required. The relevant guidelines are TGD-025 for Primary School site identification and TGD-027 for Post-Primary site identification. All technical guidelines are available at: www.gov.ie/en/publication/7e515-technical-guidance-documents/

The recommended site area, outlined in these guidelines, for a 750 pupil post primary school is 3.81 Hectares and 4.57 Hectares for an 1,000 pupil post primary school.

These guidelines are not intended to be prescriptive and cover a number of technical criteria to be taken into account when appraising the suitability and development potential of a site for a new school relative to other available options.

The site is zoned ‘New Residential’ and there is also an Objective on the site to develop a new community park. There are no plans to develop a post primary school on this site.