This article is from page 103 of the 2008-10-07 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 103 JPG
THE little students and their teach- ers at Tuamgraney National School will this month be celebrating hav- ing room to breathe with the official opening of their new school exten- sion.
Schoolwork last year was often a bit of a squash for the youngsters, who were attending classes squeezed into what had been the library and computer room. The teachers had to dismantle the library and stow away the books and computers because the school was so stuck for space.
That was before the new extension went up, giving Tuamgraney two new classrooms and a full-time re- source room.
“It was funded by the Department of Education and cost more than €200,000 but it has really made a huge difference to the school,’ said Board of Management treasurer and parent of pupils at the school, Regine Roskam.
The school has 80 pupils, three full time teachers and a resource teacher and the extra space in the two storey extension will also be used for after- school classes in speech and drama
and French.
But while the spatial challenges have been largely solved for the present, parents, teachers and pu- pils are looking forward to next year when they will have an teacher allo- cated to them.
“We have 80 children enrolled at present. If we had just five more, we would have got another teacher but with 80, we won’t get that new mem- ber of staff until next year. To solve the problem for now, the eleven chil- dren in third class are floating. In the morning they join the first and sec- ond classes, so there are 36 children
in the class and in the afternoon they switch to go in with the fourth and sixth classes which gives us 31 kids in one room. It’s not ideal but it’s the best we can do until next year when we get another teacher,” said Regine
The board also had to get busy on fund-raising ideas as the original 1895 school building needed re-plas- tering and repairs to roof and win- dows when the new extension was ene im
‘“We’re very happy to have the new space and now the teachers can re-es- tablish the library in the room which they had to use for classes,” she said.