Parents are not asking for denominational schools to disappear

A clear majority of parents who responded to the Government’s school survey do not want their children’s schools to move away from a denominational ethos.

Only 40 pc said they would like to see their school become multi-denominational. That means 60pc did not. No county recorded a majority in favour of change. Even Wicklow, which had the highest support for change, was still below 50pc. These are only county-level figures for now; the individual school results, which will matter much more in practice, will be presented in May.

Participation in the survey was significant, but still limited. The Department of Education said the validated household response rate was 41.3pc. This was not a general poll of the public. It asked parents in denominational schools whether they wanted a change of ethos. 

As in many consultations, those who want change are often more motivated to reply. If so, the 40pc figure may even overstate support for divestment. The parents who did not respond could easily change the picture, and it is perfectly reasonable to think most of them are content with the current model.

According to the Department of Education’s own figures, currently 88.3pc of primary schools are Catholic, 5.5pc are multi-denominational, and the rest are under other religious patrons, mainly Church of Ireland. (Multi-denominational would include Educate Together schools, which prefer to call themselves "equality-based schools").

Nothing in this survey suggests parents are clamouring for a wholesale remaking of that system.

Yet much of the media coverage created a different impression. The Irish Times reported a “large number of parents” seeking a shift to multi-denominational ethos, while RTÉ led with “40% of parents want multi-denominational schools”. 

Those headlines are not false, but they do give a misleading sense of momentum. The more important figure is that a clear majority did not support change.

The Department itself also framed the issue in a way that was far from neutral. In its FAQ on patronage transfer, it stated: “To support Irish society changes, it is important to consider the option of making schools with a multi-denominational ethos more widely available, where the school community supports this. … There is demand for schools that don’t have a denominational/religious ethos at their core.”

That language plainly presents one direction of change as the natural and desirable one. It is not hard to see how this could influence responses.

There is, however, one area where parents do appear strongly open to change: mixed-sex education. The survey found high support for moving single-sex schools to co-education status, even in places where parents want to keep the school’s ethos. That is an important distinction. Parents seem open to practical modernisation, but not to a radical break with the school’s identity.

The real lesson of this survey is straightforward. Parents are not asking for denominational schools to disappear. Support for them remains stronger than many policymakers and commentators seem willing to admit.