THE GAP between the performance of fee-paying and non-fee-paying second-level schools is narrowing, according to the latest Irish Times Feeder School List published this morning.
Some 33 of the top 50 feeder schools in the State are not fee-paying.
This represents significant progress by non-fee-paying schools compared to last year, when 60 per cent of schools on the top list were fee-paying.
This year’s list shows a striking performance by many non-fee- paying schools, including Knocklyon Community School and Muckross Park in Dublin; Athlone Community College, Co Westmeath; Maynooth Vocational School, Co Kildare; and Castletroy Community College, Co Limerick.
The list also shows a significant drop-off in the numbers attending grind schools, only three of which make the top 50 list.
The number of students taking the Leaving Cert at the Institute of Education, the biggest grind school in the State, has dropped by 18 per cent in the past year.
For the first time today, The Irish Times also publishes a list tracking progression to high-points courses in the seven universities, the teacher-training colleges, the Dublin Institute of Technology and the Royal College of Surgeons.
Fee-paying schools dominate on this list, with five Dublin schools emerging with a 100 per cent progression rate to these high-points courses.
These are Holy Child, Killiney; Gonzaga, in Ranelagh; Mount Anville, Goatstown; and the Gaelscoileanna Coláiste Eoin and Coláiste Íosagáin in Stillorgan.
The Irish Times Feeder School List tracks the number of students progressing to higher education in the Republic, Northern Ireland and Britain from over 700 schools in the State.
Overall, the progression rate of students going to higher education has increased in all schools.
There has also been a marked decline in the number of students taking a gap year amid concerns that student fees might return. Students from previous Leaving Cert years are also returning to college.
The list also reveals the two-tier nature of the Irish education system. While every student in certain middle-class areas proceeds to college, the progression rate is less than 30 per cent across huge swathes of working-class areas in Dublin, Cork and Limerick.
Last night, Minister for Education Batt O’Keeffe reaffirmed his opposition to “crude league tables” as a means of assessing school performance.
For the past three years the Department of Education has been publishing school inspector reports – partly in response to the popularity of feeder school lists among parents. Over 3,000 such reports have been published but they make no mention of exam performance. The department reports have been criticised for their bland analysis of school performance. However, the tone of some reports has become more robust in the past year.