Photo: Colin Park · CC BY-SA 2.0Fewer single-sex secondaries around Bantry than around Co. Cork’s towns or Irish towns: 0%
That puts Bantry below both Co. Cork’s towns (44%) and Irish towns (39%). Coláiste Pobail Bheanntraí, with 752 pupils, is the only secondary school within 3 km. Nothing here grades or ranks these schools: Ireland publishes no results school by school, and the Education Act 1998 restricts comparing them.
Schools in the town or within 3 km of its outline, Department of Education lists for 2025/26; the Ireland figures cover all schools listed.
What stands out about Bantry’s schools
More all-Irish schools than most places
Families here have more choice of a school that teaches every subject through Irish than in most of Ireland, where 8% of schools do. The school is Gaelscoil Bheanntrai (119). Language ↓
Facts from the Department of Education’s lists; nothing here judges how well a school teaches.
Teaching through Irish in and around Bantry
Schools by the language they teach in; the black tick is Ireland’s share.
1 of Bantry’s 4 schools teach every subject through Irish: Gaelscoil Bheanntrai.
The 4 schools in and around Bantry
Every school in Bantry or within 3 km of its outline, each linked to its own page. Ireland publishes no school-by-school results, which is why these cards have no letters.
Where the 4 schools in and around Bantry are
Each school where the official list places it, shaded by who runs it and sized by pupils; squares are secondary schools, triangles special schools. The dashed shape is Bantry’s outline; schools within 3 km of it count.
Places from the Department of Education’s school lists (its own coordinates for all but a handful); map tiles © OpenStreetMap contributors.
Who Bantry’s schools serve
Shares of the pupils at the area’s schools, beside Co. Cork’s and Ireland’s, 2025/26
Each bar is the area’s share; the tick marks Ireland’s.
DEIS by stage: pupils at DEIS schools
| Share of pupils | Around Bantry | Co. Cork | Ireland |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pupils at DEIS schools | 0% | 18% | 27% |
| Pupils at all-Irish schools | 10% | 8% | 6% |
| Girls | 47% | 49% | 49% |
Fewer of the pupils around Bantry are at DEIS schools than across Ireland: 0% against 27% (Co. Cork: 18%).
Each of the 4 schools
| School | Pupils | Girls | DEIS | All-Irish |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Coláiste Pobail BheanntraíPost-primary · ETB | 752 | 47% | ||
| Gaelscoil BheanntraiPrimary | 119 | 47% | ✓ | |
| St Brendans National SchoolPrimary | 26 | 50% | ||
| Scoil Mhuire agus BharraPrimary | 330 | 47% |
Department of Education school lists 2025/26 (preliminary): enrolments by sex and the DEIS list. Shares are of pupils, not of schools; a county’s are the schools listed with its towns.
Who runs Bantry’s schools
Ethos as listed for 2025/26: each bar splits the schools by who runs them.
2 of Bantry’s 4 schools have a Catholic ethos, against 80% across Ireland. The patrons with most schools here: Cork ETB (1), Bishop of Cork & Ross (1) and Bishop of Cork, Cloyne & Ross COI (1). None of the 4 is in DEIS, the extra support for schools in disadvantaged areas (30% across Ireland).
Department of Education school lists: ethos 2025/26, patron 2024/25 (the 2025/26 lists don’t give it). DEIS list 2025/26.
The 4 patrons of Bantry’s schools
Each school has a patron that owns it and sets its ethos; its board of management runs it.
The schools around Bantry answer to 4 patrons, and Cork ETB leads with 1 of the 4 schools and 61% of their pupils. The local Education and Training Board runs one.
| Patron | Ethos | Schools | Pupils |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cork ETBColáiste Pobail Bheanntraí | Inter-denominational | 1 | 752 |
| Bishop of cork and RosScoil Mhuire agus Bharra | Catholic | 1 | 330 |
| Bishop of Cork & RossGaelscoil Bheanntrai | Catholic | 1 | 119 |
| Bishop of Cork, Cloyne & Ross COISt Brendans | Church of Ireland | 1 | 26 |
Department of Education school lists: patron 2024/25, ethos 2025/26.
How children get a place in Bantry
Starting primary school
Children can start primary school once they are four, and must be in school by six. Families apply to each school directly. Every school publishes an admission policy and a yearly admission notice; a school with more applicants than places admits on the criteria in its policy. Since the Education (Admission to Schools) Act 2018, a Catholic or other majority-faith primary school can’t put baptised children first; a school of a minority faith still can, to keep its ethos.
Moving to secondary school
Children move to post-primary school at about twelve, after sixth class. Again, families apply to each school, usually a year or more ahead, and an oversubscribed school admits on its published criteria, often brothers and sisters and its feeder primary schools.
Education (Admission to Schools) Act 2018; each school’s admission policy and notice are on its own website.
Which schools are growing
Between 2019/20 and now, 1 of the 2 grew by 5% or more and 1 shrank as much, while Ireland’s pupil numbers moved +5%.
Department of Education enrolments at 30 September, 2019/20 and 2025/26 (preliminary). No capacity is published, so how full a school is can’t be shown.
Inspection reports for Bantry’s schools
Reports from the Department of Education’s Inspectorate, every school’s linked and none rated
Inspectors visit every kind of school. Whole-school evaluations look at teaching and learning, leadership and management; subject inspections look at one subject; follow-through inspections check whether earlier advice was taken. Each report is published on gov.ie with the school’s response.
The reports describe what inspectors saw and what each school should do next. They give no overall grade, so none is shown here; the 4 schools below each link their own.
| School | Reports on gov.ie |
|---|---|
| Coláiste Pobail BheanntraíPost-primary · ETB | Inspection reports ↗ |
| Gaelscoil BheanntraiPrimary | Inspection reports ↗ |
| St Brendans National SchoolPrimary | Inspection reports ↗ |
| Scoil Mhuire agus BharraPrimary | Inspection reports ↗ |
Department of Education Inspectorate reports on gov.ie, found by each school’s roll number.
Post-primary schools within reach of Bantry
Post-primary schools within 10 km of the town; children move at about twelve, and families apply to each school
The only post-primary school within 10 km of Bantry is Coláiste Pobail Bheanntraí, an ETB school. It takes girls and boys. None within 10 km teaches every subject through Irish.
| School | Takes | Also | Pupils | Away |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Coláiste Pobail BheanntraíETB · Inter-denominational | Girls and boys | – | 752 | 0.9 km |
Department of Education post-primary list 2025/26; straight-line distances from the town’s centre point.
Special schools and classes around Bantry
No special school is in or near Bantry. 2 of the 3 primary schools have special classes for children who need more support. Their cards ↑
Special schools and primary schools with special classes as the Department lists them; the National Council for Special Education places pupils in special classes.
Bantry beside the 85 other Irish towns of 2,100 to 4,000 people
Schools in or within 3 km of each town, by population; none is ranked, as Ireland publishes no results
| Town | People | Schools | Pupils | All-Irish | DEIS schools | Nearest post-primary |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Charleville | 3,970 | 6 | 1,334 | 0 | 50% | 0.3 km |
| … | ||||||
| Bailieborough | 2,974 | 5 | 1,420 | 0 | 20% | 0.1 km |
| Ballina | 2,959 | 4 | 1,336 | 0 | 50% | 1.1 km |
| Kingscourt | 2,955 | 5 | 1,252 | 0 | 0% | 0.8 km |
| Muinebeag (Bagenalstown) | 2,945 | 6 | 1,570 | 0 | 50% | 0.5 km |
| Bantry | 2,929 | 4 | 1,227 | 1 | 0% | 0.9 km |
| Ballyjamesduff | 2,917 | 2 | 1,000 | 0 | 50% | 0.6 km |
| Boyle | 2,915 | 4 | 1,103 | 0 | 0% | 0.2 km |
| Murrough | 2,909 | 22 | 7,826 | 2 | 41% | 1.6 km |
| Skibbereen | 2,903 | 5 | 1,562 | 1 | 0% | 0.8 km |
| … | ||||||
| Dunleer | 2,143 | 5 | 1,205 | 0 | 20% | 0.8 km |
Among the 85 other towns, 57 have more pupils at their schools than Bantry does. Within 3 km, 42 of these 86 towns have a school teaching through Irish.
Department of Education school lists 2025/26 (preliminary); CSO Census 2022 populations.
Pupil numbers around Bantry
Each September’s pupils at every school in or within 3 km of the town, counted where the school stands today.
The schools in and around Bantry had 1,237 pupils in 2015/16 and 1,227 in 2025/26, fewer than before.
Pupils at schools in and around Bantry
Department of Education enrolments at 30 September each year, 2015/16 to 2025/26 (preliminary), for every school placed in the area today; schools that have since closed or merged count where they stood.
What this data can and can’t tell you
- Which schools count. Every school in Bantry or within 3 km of its outline, as the Department places it: families here use them. Schools further out are on the map of each school’s own page.
- The kinds of school. Primary schools take children from junior infants to sixth class, about ages 4 to 12. Post-primary schools teach the Junior and Leaving Certificate, about ages 12 to 18: voluntary secondary schools (mostly with a religious patron), ETB schools and community colleges run by an Education and Training Board, and community and comprehensive schools. Special schools teach children with particular needs.
- Teaching through Irish. All-Irish: every subject taught through Irish, in the Gaeltacht or, outside it, a Gaelscoil or Gaelcholáiste. Partly in Irish: an Irish stream (some classes entirely through Irish) or some subjects through Irish. Every other school teaches Irish as a subject.
- DEIS. DEIS (Delivering Equality of Opportunity in Schools) gives schools serving disadvantaged areas more teachers, money and support; the Department decides which schools are in it.
- Ethos and patron. Most Irish schools are owned by a patron, mostly a church; the patron sets the school’s ethos. Multi-denominational schools (Educate Together, many ETB schools) teach children of every faith and none together.
- No grade. Section 53 of the Education Act 1998 lets the Minister refuse to release information that would allow schools’ exam results to be compared, and no results are published school by school. So Ireland’s schools have no letters and its towns no School Grade; nothing on this page ranks them.
- What isn’t here. What the UK and French pages show from results, these can’t: results charts, results against pupils’ backgrounds and towns ranked by their schools (no published results), and how full each school is (no capacity is published). Every post-primary school teaches to the Leaving Certificate, so there is no sixth-form split to show.
- Inspections. The Inspectorate’s reports are linked from each school’s page. They give no overall grade, so none is shown.
- The year. The 2025/26 lists are the Department’s preliminary release; numbers can change a little in the final lists.
Questions about schools in Bantry
How many schools are there in Bantry?
In Bantry or within 3 km of it: 3 primary schools and 1 secondary school, with 1,227 pupils between them.
Are there schools in Bantry that teach through Irish?
Yes, 1: Gaelscoil Bheanntrai teach every subject through Irish.
Are there fee-paying secondary schools near Bantry?
No: the secondary school here is free.
What is the best school in Bantry?
We don’t say. Ireland publishes no exam results school by school, and section 53 of the Education Act 1998 restricts comparing them; a ranking would rest on guesses. Each school’s page has its own facts and a link to its inspection reports, and visiting the schools you are weighing is still the best guide.
How do I get a place at a school in Bantry?
Apply to each school directly: every school publishes an admission policy and a yearly admission notice with its dates. If it has more applicants than places, it admits on the criteria in its policy.
Sources: Department of Education, school lists 2025/26 (preliminary) and enrolments since 2015/16, CC BY 4.0 · one school placed with OpenStreetMap (© OpenStreetMap contributors, ODbL). Under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 (CC BY 4.0).
Contains Central Statistics Office (CSO) data, Census 2022, and Tailte Éireann boundaries (CSO Urban Areas, Small Areas, local electoral areas, constituencies), under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 (CC BY 4.0).