A Co Kildare primary school has been refused an additional teacher by the Department of Education after it enrolled 25 more pupils who were left in a “crisis” with no place confirmed for the upcoming school year. The school says it has had to amalgamate two current senior infant groups “into one large first class of 34” pupils from September.“While this is less than ideal, it is a reality that we need to address, for the coming year at least,” St Corban’s National School in Naas, Co Kildare, wrote in a letter addressed to parents and guardians, adding this “has been very stressful” for the school community.The school said the department had “formally requested” that it enrol the additional class of junior infants. However, with no additional staff member to teach them, it was left “with only one credible option” to create the large first class, well over the average 23 pupil to one teacher ratio in the State.The department informed the school that it “cannot refuse to take these extra junior infant children whom we have enrolled”, according to the letter. “The department refuses to accept that this is an exceptional case,” it continued, after “relentless” communication with officials over the last four months. The school unsuccessfully appealed the department’s initial decision not to allocate an additional teacher and ultimately engaged with the assistant secretary general of the department in an online meeting.“We have all explored every possible administrative and political avenue to have the extra teacher allocated. We have exhausted all of our avenues of appeals,” the school wrote, adding that parents “lobbied and met with local TDs … but to no avail.” The school said it has allocated the largest room in the building for the incoming first-class group, who will be taught by “an experienced teacher” with “extra support teachers to the class each day, especially in English and Maths”. In a statement, a spokesman for the Department of Education said: “St Corban’s NS does not meet the criteria for the allocation of a twentieth mainstream classroom teacher under the primary staffing schedule.“The key factors for determining the level of staffing resources provided at individual school level are the staffing schedule for the relevant school year and pupil enrolments on the previous 30 September. “The school’s projected enrollment for September 2026 remains below the threshold for a 20th mainstream teacher ... This staffing schedule operates in a transparent manner and treats all similar types of schools equally.”