Small rural schools are the heartbeat of the community, they must be saved

OPINION:The Government's value-for-money audit is threatening the survival of small rural schools – but to close them would be a false economy, writes JOHN McKENNA

OUR FINANCIAL predicament in today’s Ireland is so parlous and so unpredictable that none of us can truthfully say: “We have been here before”. But other countries can say that they have been in pretty much the same mess that we find ourselves in.

We need to look at how they dug themselves out of the hole, corrected their finances and, as regards the seed bed of primary education, made sure that they were producing bright, well-educated children to help with the recovery of the economy and the recovery of the country.

Finland is one country which has been in a similar situation as Ireland is in today. In the early 1990s Finland’s economy was in tatters. Their unemployment rate was higher than ours, and their GDP plummeted.

So, what did they do? They increased spending on education and they clambered quickly out of recession, they rebuilt their economy, and their country.

Today, Finnish schoolchildren are top of European league tables in numeracy and literacy, thanks to generous spending on education, which accounts for

7 per cent of GDP. We spend less that 5 per cent of GDP on education. And the Government wants to cut back on even this low rate.

That is what is being proposed via the Small Primary Schools Value For Money Review. Primary schools with less than 50 pupils are being examined as part of a plan to save €20 million.

If small primary schools are forced to close, amalgamate and cut resources, you can be assured of one thing: children’s quality of education will suffer.

We won’t create kids who will be on top of the smart economy, and who will be leaders in the literacy and numeracy stakes. We will produce kids for Terminal 2 departures, and for a life on the dole. Our seed capital, for our economy, our culture and our future, will be still-born.

We are threatening to make a dire situation even worse by doing the opposite of what the Finns did. I say this because, as a parent of three children who have enjoyed the immeasurable benefits of a primary eduction at St James’ National School in Durrus, West Cork, I am conscious of how lucky they are to have been part of a school which has been part of the community since 1792, and which has maintained the ethos of the Church of Ireland since then.

Small primary schools have deep roots in their local place, their local culture, and their local communities. Numerous surveys and reports have shown that small primary schools help children to be independent learners, at the same time as having their individual needs recognised.

The kids are better at maths, and get fully involved with all the activities of the school, from the Christmas play to sports day and the much-looked-forward-to school trips. St James’ and its staff take an holistic approach to educating children, rather than looking at it on a simple, banal, cost-benefit analysis – which the Department of Education is proposing to do – and personally I think we need to look at our small schools on a cultural-benefit analysis, and a future-benefit analysis.

If you find yourself in trouble, plant more seed for the future.

That is what education secures: it secures the future. Bright, happy kids become bright, happy adults, workers and parents in the future.

Ensuring the survival of small, rural primary schools also ensures the survival of small, rural communities and their culture. Small primary schools in west Cork are a pivotal part of the “west Cork” thing, that marvellous mix of culture and creativity which allows west Cork to thrive despite its pitiful lack of infrastructure. Losing local schools in a penny-pinching, short-sighted exercise threatens the very “west Cork” culture that animates the vital tourism industry.

So, let’s follow best practice in the area of primary education and small schools. Let’s do what Finland did: let’s invest in our children, and in our own future. Our children can help us out of this mess, but only if we help them to be their best.

John McKenna is editor of the Bridgestone guides