St Patrick's College: Supportive, inclusive and now co-educational
St Patrick’s College is now a co-educational school, with first year being one-third boys and two-thirds girls.
The principal of St Patrick’s College, Brian Cronin, is expecting a lot of interest on Open Night 2024 (Tuesday September 24, 6pm-8pm) for enrolment for first year 2025, now that the Gardiner’s Hill based school is co-educational. Up until this year, it was an all girls school. First year is now one-third boys and two-thirds girls, but the school board of management is committed to keeping the school relatively small, maintaining its friendly atmosphere. Class sizes average about eighteen students, sometimes less than this. Other schools typically have about twenty-eight students in each class.
“Students are known by name,” Principal Cronin says. “I think teenagers need that in order to thrive. They get plenty of individual attention from their teachers and SNAs (Special Needs Assistants). It’s a school with high expectations for learning and behaviour.”
There are thirty teachers at St Patrick’s College and eight SNAs, all very experienced, caring and committed to the students.
The school has expanded its facility for students on the autism spectrum and prides itself on being an autism-friendly school. “We have three special classes located in what we call An Cuan. The staff are very open to working with autistic students and their families.”
The school has a sensory room that cost €10,000 to set up, funded by the Department of Education. It has comfortable furniture and different types of light that can be adjusted for degrees of brightness. This quiet space ensures that students with autism get to experience calmness in a world that can sometimes seem overwhelming.
With its strong academic record, the emphasis is on making sure that every student reaches their potential. This year, over 30% of the Leaving Cert class of 2024 earned more than 450 points and over 60% achieved 400 points or more.
“A student’s potential could be over 500 points in the Leaving Certificate or it could be somebody passing all their subjects or doing well in the Leaving Cert Applied, an alternative to the Leaving Cert”. The school has an individual mentoring system provided by staff for each Leaving Cert student during 6th year.
The curriculum is changing and at St Patrick’s College, it is expanding. “We introduced three new practical subjects this year; Applied Technology, Technical Graphics and Art. We’ve always had Home Economics. We ask everyone to try each of these subjects in first year in September. They can then make decisions in January about what to keep on.”
Mr Cronin believes in the importance of variety in the curriculum. “It wouldn’t be right to have a curriculum that’s too slanted towards pure academic learning. It wouldn’t make sense for young people in the 21st century.”
A new Applied Technology room and a new toilet block are being developed at the school funded by the Department of Education. ICT (information and communication technology) is embedded in the curriculum. Each student has their own laptop, a chromebook, provided by the school.
“The laptops fit in with the platform we use in the school. They’re very user-friendly from the point of view of the students. We set them up with secure school email and passwords that we have control over. It allows them easy access to lots of different apps and programmes so they can work on projects that are all stored in our cloud. Classroom-based assessment projects are part of the new Junior Cycle. What we’re trying to do is move to a situation where they are done digitally. It just means that no one loses their work. With paper projects, they can sometimes get lost. It’s much easier for the students and for us to keep track of them.”
On a voluntary basis, three teachers as well as Mr Cronin keep track of the digital work. “We have one teacher, Eimear Callan, who manages the whole thing without too much drama.”
The school is Catholic, Mr Cronin says: “However, we don’t turn people away because they’re not Catholic or don’t practise. The school patron Bishop Fintan Gavin and the Diocese are interested in seeing an inclusive Catholic secondary school. We don’t do indoctrination. The way we look at it, the Catholic ethos permeates the school and gives us our strong values — dignity, respect, kindness, trust and cooperation. Dignity is absolutely essential in the way we treat the students and in the way they relate to one another and to the staff.”
When it comes to sport, the school tries to tailor activities that the students are interested in. Basketball, soccer, camogie, Gaelic football, indoor rowing and orienteering are offered. This year, the school got athletics up and running. Off-campus activities see the students take part in interschools competitions.
Every student at St Patrick’s College can avail of a daily free breakfast and a hot lunch. There is also a subsidised tuck shop for snacks later in the day. The school opens at 8.10am and the canteen is busy around 8.30am serving cereal, tea, scones, toast and croissants.
The students are well looked after in this inclusive school. “One of the questions that we ask the students every year is whether they feel safe and cared for at St Patricks. Consistently, over 95% reply ‘yes,’” says Mr Cronin. A win-win for this welcoming school.
To find out more about enrolment, click here and come to the school’s open night on September 24th.
