Photo: Liam Murphy · CC BY-SA 2.0Around Moneenroe, 67% of schools get DEIS support, more than around Co. Kilkenny’s towns or Irish towns
That puts Moneenroe above both Co. Kilkenny’s towns (11%) and Irish towns (35%). 2 of its 3 schools are in DEIS, the extra support for schools in disadvantaged areas, against 30% across Ireland. Ireland publishes no school results, and the Education Act 1998 restricts comparing them, so these schools are described here, never graded or ranked.
Every school in the town or within 3 km of its outline, from the Department of Education’s lists for 2025/26; Ireland’s figures are every school in the lists.
What stands out about Moneenroe’s schools
Extra support for many schools
Many schools here are in DEIS, which gives schools in disadvantaged areas more teachers, money and help; across Ireland, 30% of schools are. In DEIS: S.N. an Moinin Rua (127) and St Patricks N.S. (57). Who runs them ↓
From the Department of Education’s school lists: facts, not judgements of how well a school teaches.
Where the 3 schools in and around Moneenroe 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 Moneenroe’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 runs Moneenroe’s schools
Ethos as listed for 2025/26: each bar splits the schools by who runs them.
2 of Moneenroe’s 3 schools have a Catholic ethos, against 80% across Ireland. The patrons with most schools here: Bishop of Ossory (2) and Bishop of Cashel, Ferns & Ossory COI (1). 2 of the 3 are 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 3 schools in and around Moneenroe
Here are the schools in Moneenroe or within 3 km of it, every one with its own page. Ireland publishes no school-by-school results, which is why these cards have no letters.
Teaching through Irish in and around Moneenroe
How many schools teach through each language; the tick marks Ireland’s share.
None of the 3 schools in and around Moneenroe teaches every subject through Irish.
Who Moneenroe’s schools serve
How the area’s pupils divide, against Co. Kilkenny’s and Ireland’s, 2025/26
Each bar is the area’s share; the tick marks Ireland’s.
| Share of pupils | Around Moneenroe | Co. Kilkenny | Ireland |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pupils at DEIS schools | 78% | 20% | 27% |
| Pupils at all-Irish schools | 0% | 3% | 6% |
| Girls | 47% | 49% | 49% |
Around Moneenroe, 78% of pupils attend a school in DEIS; across Ireland it is 27%, and 20% in Co. Kilkenny. Furthest from Ireland’s mix is the share of pupils at all-Irish schools: 0% here against 6%. The biggest school in DEIS is S.N. an Moinin Rua (127 pupils).
Each of the 3 schools
| School | Pupils | Girls | DEIS | All-Irish |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| S.N. an Moinin RuaPrimary | 127 | 53% | ✓ | |
| St Patricks N.S.Primary | 57 | 39% | ✓ | |
| Wandesforde Mixed N.S.Primary | 52 | 42% |
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.
The 2 patrons of Moneenroe’s schools
Patrons own the schools and set their ethos; boards of management run them day to day.
The schools around Moneenroe answer to 2 patrons, and Bishop of Ossory leads with 2 of the 3 schools and 78% of their pupils.
| Patron | Ethos | Schools | Pupils |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bishop of OssoryS.N. an Moinin Rua, St Patricks | Catholic | 2 | 184 |
| Bishop of Cashel, Ferns & Ossory COIWandesforde Mixed | Church of Ireland | 1 | 52 |
Department of Education school lists: patron 2024/25, ethos 2025/26.
How children get a place in Moneenroe
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
0 schools here have grown by 5% or more since 2019/20, 2 have shrunk by as much, out of 3; across Ireland: +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 Moneenroe’s schools
The Inspectorate’s published reports for each school, linked, without ratings
Reports come from whole-school evaluations (teaching, learning, leadership and management), subject inspections and follow-through visits that check earlier advice; gov.ie publishes each one with the school’s response.
Reports say what inspectors found and what should improve, without an overall grade, so none appears here; each of the 3 schools below links its own.
| School | Reports on gov.ie |
|---|---|
| S.N. an Moinin RuaPrimary | Inspection reports ↗ |
| St Patricks N.S.Primary | Inspection reports ↗ |
| Wandesforde Mixed N.S.Primary | Inspection reports ↗ |
Department of Education Inspectorate reports on gov.ie, found by each school’s roll number.
Post-primary schools within reach of Moneenroe
Every post-primary school within 10 km of the town; families choose and apply to each, at about twelve
The only post-primary school within 10 km of Moneenroe is Community School, a community school. It takes girls and boys. None within 10 km teaches every subject through Irish.
| School | Takes | Also | Pupils | Away |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Community SchoolCommunity school · Inter-denominational | Girls and boys | DEIS | 634 | 5.2 km |
Department of Education post-primary list 2025/26; straight-line distances from the town’s centre point.
Moneenroe beside the 187 other Irish towns of 500 to 1,000 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Castletownbere | 999 | 3 | 524 | 0 | 67% | 0.4 km |
| … | ||||||
| Corrofin | 745 | 3 | 466 | 0 | 0% | 8.4 km |
| Loughshinny | 741 | 10 | 3,960 | 1 | 10% | 3.1 km |
| Killenard | 741 | 3 | 1,391 | 0 | 0% | 5 km |
| Taghmon | 740 | 1 | 183 | 0 | 100% | 9 km |
| Moneenroe | 739 | 3 | 236 | 0 | 67% | 5.2 km |
| Kildalkey | 739 | 1 | 210 | 0 | 0% | 6 km |
| Castlefinn | 730 | 4 | 234 | 0 | 100% | 7.7 km |
| Bweeng | 728 | 1 | 113 | 0 | 0% | 10 km |
| An Cheathrú Rua | 725 | 3 | 661 | 2 | 67% | 0.8 km |
| … | ||||||
| Stradbally | 500 | 2 | 134 | 0 | 0% | 8.7 km |
Among the 187 other towns, 95 have more pupils at their schools than Moneenroe does. Teaching through Irish is on offer within 3 km in 16 of the 188.
Department of Education school lists 2025/26 (preliminary); CSO Census 2022 populations.
Pupil numbers around Moneenroe
Every school in or within 3 km of the town each September, counted where it stands today.
The schools in and around Moneenroe had 244 pupils in 2015/16 and 236 in 2025/26, fewer than before.
Pupils at schools in and around Moneenroe
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.
Schools in the towns around Moneenroe
For each nearby town, its schools in or within 3 km of its outline, with straight-line distances.
| Town | Schools | Pupils | All-Irish | DEIS schools | Nearest post-primary |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Moneenroe | 3 | 236 | 0 | 67% | 5.2 km |
| Castlecomer 5.2 km | 3 | 807 | 0 | 67% | 0.5 km |
| Ballyragget 13 km | 1 | 163 | 0 | 0% | 8 km |
| Ballylinan 14 km | 3 | 435 | 0 | 0% | 7.2 km |
| Abbeyleix 15 km | 2 | 353 | 0 | 0% | 4.5 km |
| Carlow 16 km | 19 | 7,832 | 2 | 42% | 0.7 km |
Carlow has the most schools teaching through Irish nearby: 2. Since 2019/20 the pupils around Moneenroe changed by −9%; among its neighbours, Ballyragget’s grew most (+20%) and Abbeyleix’s least (−16%).
What this data can and can’t tell you
- Which schools count. Every school in Moneenroe 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 Moneenroe
How many schools are there in Moneenroe?
In Moneenroe or within 3 km of it: 3 primary schools, with 236 pupils between them.
Are there schools in Moneenroe that teach through Irish?
None in Moneenroe or within 3 km of it teaches every subject through Irish; some teach it as a subject only.
Is there a secondary school in Moneenroe?
Not in Moneenroe or within 3 km of it; the nearest is Community School, 5.2 km away.
What is the best school in Moneenroe?
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 Moneenroe?
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).