Naoise Ó Cearúil (Kildare North, Fianna Fail)
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290. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills her plans to use data from the school admissions pilot to forecast demand and prioritise capacity expansion, including new builds or extensions, in oversubscribed growth areas such as Maynooth, Kilcock and Celbridge; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [68015/25]

Hildegarde Naughton (Galway West, Fine Gael)
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The Apply to School pilot was introduced to simplify and improve the admissions process for post-primary schools in five pilot areas including Celbridge. This new system provides families, for the first time, with a single online application and introduces synchronised, streamlined timelines for schools to manage admissions, issue offers, and update a central database to record accepted places. Other areas will be taken into consideration for future iterations of the pilot.

I wish to advise the Deputy that schools continue to operate in line with the Education (Admission to Schools) Act 2018 and their own Admissions Policies. Under this process, some applicants may receive more than one offer, while others may not receive an offer until later in the process. The centralised system helps identify duplicate acceptances and supports families in achieving certainty on school places earlier.

As part of this process, a second round of offers will be issued on 4 December. This ensures that any places that become available after the first round are allocated fairly and that every child is considered.

I want to reassure parents that there are sufficient first-year places in each pilot area for local children seeking a place. The Department will closely monitor the outcomes of the admissions process to ensure that all local children are accommodated and to identify any required solutions if necessary. The Apply to School pilot will provide early clarity and robust data to support this commitment.

Department officials will continue to work in consultation with stakeholders to develop an evidence-informed, tested, equitable solution for a nationwide Common Application System and to deliver this in an incremental way that ensures the admissions process safeguards the best interest of children.

Furthermore, the data sharing arrangements that were in place for the 2025/26 admissions process have been put in place again for the 2026/27 admissions process in school planning areas that are experiencing enrolment pressures, including Maynooth and Kilcock. The admissions data provided by schools will allow the department to analyse duplicate applications as there can be significant overlap in areas.

The Deputy will appreciate that there can often be significant overlap across areas and schools, and the nature of the admissions processes is quite complex. As a result, there can be multiple iterations, where applicants may accept a place but subsequently be offered and accept a place at a second school, freeing up capacity at the first school accepted. In that context, it may take some time for my department to fully review the availability of post-primary school places while the admissions process continues to progress.

Since 2020, my department has invested over €382 million in school infrastructure across County Kildare. The department is continually planning for and investing in existing and new schools to ensure that every child in the State has access to a school place.

Data available to my department for the 2024/25 academic year highlights that 21% of first year places were unfilled across the school planning areas of Celbridge, Maynooth and Kilcock. The provision of additional school places can be required in a very small number of areas. This can be facilitated by a range of strategies, some of which may involve additional accommodation but also optimising use of existing capacity.

There are number of active projects at post-primary level in Maynooth, Kilcock and Celbridge that will increase capacity including new school buildings for Gaelcholáiste Mhaigh Nuad, Celbridge Community School and Enfield Community College. In addition, there are extension projects ongoing for St. Wolstan’s Community College and Scoil Dara.

The Capital Programme details the school projects that are being progressed under Project Ireland 2040. The current status of large-scale projects being delivered under Project Ireland 2040, may be viewed on the Department's website at, www.gov.ie and this information is updated regularly. In addition, a list of large-scale projects completed from 2010 to date may also be viewed on the website.

I can assure the Deputy that my department will continue to work to ensure a school place for every child in Maynooth, Kilcock and Celbridge, and across the rest of the country, including by advancing required school building projects.