Niall Blaney (Donegal North East, Fianna Fail)
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Question 517: To ask the Minister for Education and Science the progress made in relation to an application for an extension by a school (details supplied) in County Donegal since a previous parliamentary question dated 29 June 2006; if she will investigate the possibility of speeding up the process of putting their extension in place for use; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [31693/06]

Mary Hanafin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)
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The proposed extension project for the school referred to by the Deputy is at an early stage of architectural planning and is one of the 124 schools that I announced in April of 2005 to progress through the architectural planning process.

On the 20th March 2006 a letter issued to the School Authorities with revised schedules of accommodation requesting them to get their Design Team to revise the original stage 1 (Initial Sketch Scheme) as presented to the Department in October 2001 to reflect the impact of the revised schedules.

My Department has received the revised stage 1 (Initial Sketch Scheme) from the School's Design Team. My Department will shortly arrange a meeting with the School Authorities and the Design Team in order to evaluate the submission. It is envisaged that unless there are very exceptional circumstances involved, the meeting will be sufficient to authorise the project to progress to the next stage of architectural planning.

A decision on which school building projects will advance to tender and construction will be considered in the context of the School Building and Modernisation Programme 2006-2010.