Special school in Kildare 'not fit for purpose'
St Anne’s Special School in the Curragh, Co Kildare has been waiting on a new school build for 10 years
A member of St Anne's Parents Association (St Anne's Special School, The Curragh) has said members and parents are “extremely concerned” that a new build for the school has not progressed to date, despite Kildare Co Council granting planning permission on March 25 2022.
According to Nuala Henry, plans for a new build for the Kildare school are “stuck” at Stage 2b – “detailed design”, with planning permission due to expire in March 2027.
St Anne's Special School, Ballymany Cross, The Curragh, Co Kildare – under the patronage of KARE - is a co-educational school for children aged four to 18 who have been assessed as having either a moderate or severe/profound general learning disability.
74 children attend St Anne's Special School, with students coming from all over Kildare and West Wicklow.
“The school is just in bad repair, there's a lot of prefabs and stuff and at the moment and it's just not fit for purpose, it has old windows, the room sizes aren't up to standard. A lot of the children are sharing one toilet, and some of them are incontinent and need nappy changing and stuff like that.”, Nuala says.
“It's not fit for purpose, the classrooms are too small for the number of children that need to be provided for. The changing area and sensory room really aren't up to standard for for a school with special needs. Within the senior school, there's only two toilets and only one of these is wheelchair accessible. The other one is too small, and children can't really go into it. Having just one toilet isn't good enough.
“In the school we have nearly 15 children who are wheelchair users, but the school isn't wheelchair-friendly, to the extent that we don't even have wheelchair-friendly equipment in our playground. So anyone in a wheelchair, it's not inclusive, which isn't really good enough for 2026.”
Nuala says the planning process has been going on for 10 years now, and that the current application is the second for the school.
With planning due to expire in March 2027, she fears a third application may be needed if work does not commence before that date.
“We wrote to everyone and anyone, deputies, ministers, everything and a few of them have brought up questions in the Dáil and the most recent one was Senator Fiona O'Loughlin (in the Seanad) and she did bring it up.
“It's not fair on the children, it's hard enough dealing with a disability but when the school is not fit for purpose – and I know they know no better because they've put up with it for so long – but a lot of them have sensory needs. They need the nice sensory rooms, the sensory gardens, and the basics like toilets and toilets off the classrooms. Children shouldn't have to share one toilet, especially children with incontinent needs.”
Asked what she would like to see happen, Nuala says: "I'd like our new school to be built, I think the children deserve this, it's supposed to be expiring on the 25th of March 2027 and we really need works to have commenced before that date to help get it going.
“We really need to get this moved on and out for tender and start the build as soon as possible, to give the children what they deserve.”