Children Aren't Cattle; Tell Ireland Not to Close Small Schools
If the Department of Education and Skills gets its way, small schools across Ireland will close their doors and children will be shuttled out of their communities every day to get an education.
Children will spend hours a week on buses to get to schools outside of their district, leaving them less time for sleep, learning, and play.
The government has cried "budget cuts" as an excuse for this action. But not everyone agrees that closing the small schools will necessarily be more efficient--even economically. Research coming out of Melbourne University shows that small schools are just as financially viable as medium-sized schools.
All available research shows that small class sizes are tied to effective learning.
Tell Irish officials to keep their small rural schools open and not make children spend hours a week on buses going to bigger schools out of town. Local schools strengthen communities, and they often provide the best educations.
We the undersigned strongly object to the closing of your small, rural schools. This measure will only cut costs if you plan also to raise class sizes. So, in addition to bussing children miles out of their home towns, you also plan for them to land in giant schools with giant class sizes? We suspect you already know that small class size has been paired with improved learning in a number of studies. In fact, pretty much all research points to small class sizes as the most important factor in a successful education. Keep your small schools open.
