Letterkenny Councillors have agreed to write to the Minister for Education and Minister of State for Special Education to call for extra classrooms to be built urgently for Little Angels Special School.
Nine children have been turned away from places at the school in September as staff and pupils prepare to move into their new building.
Families have been told that the school is at capacity and the new building is too small, leaving them with no other options due to their children’s complex needs.
Panicked parents of eight of the children have launched an online campaign called ‘Don’t Forget Our Little Angels’ to highlight the matter.
Councillor Tomas Seán Devine from the 100% Redress Party has said that up to 34 children in total have been turned away from the school over the past year.
As a father of a child with special needs at the school, Cllr Devine told the council: “I know how much this school does for people with additional needs, I would beg you to please act urgently on this.”
The matter was raised at today’s meeting of the Letterkenny-Milford MD.
Councillor Ciaran Brogan of Fianna Fáil pointed out that the Little Angels capacity issue is “not in the making of this council”, but an issue to be dealt with by the Department of Education.
The meeting heard that in 2018, when the new school build began, Little Angels had 17 teachers and 73 pupils. Today there are 23 teachers and 133 pupils.
As the school outgrew itself, classes have also been temporarily accommodated at Educate Together National School at Kiltoy.
Councillor Jimmy Kavanagh (Fine Gael) added that he has spoken to the Minister about Little Angels and other issues in Letterkenny schools, and that he is hopeful that funding will be provided.
Councillor Donal Coyle (FF) pointed out that if extra accommodation was provided, it would not be in place by September. Cllr Coyle suggested that modular rooms could be provided as a short term solution. “We need to be looking at them now,” he said.
Cllr Devine commented that modular buildings are due to be moved from the old school to the school, stressing that the council should ‘intervene on a local level’ such as supporting planning in the future.
