THE

FOURTEENTH REPORT

OF THE

COMMISSIONERS OF NATIONAL EDUCATION IN IRELAND,

FOR THE YEAR 1847.

TO HIS EXCELLENCY GEORGE WILLIAM FREDERICK, EARL OF CLARENDON, LORD LIEUTENANT-GENERAL AND GENERAL GOVERNOR OF IRELAND.

May it please your Excellency,

I.-1. We, the Commissioners of National Education in Ireland, beg leave to submit to your Excellency this our Fourteenth Report.

II.-2. On the 31st of December, 1846, we had 3,637 schools in operation, which were attended by 456,410 children. At the close of the year 1847 the number of schools in operation was 3,825, and of pupils on the rolls, 402,632, thus showing a total increase in this class of schools of 188; but a decrease in the attendance, on the year ending the 31st of December, 1847, as compared with the year 1846.

3. In our last Report we stated that the diminished amount of the increase in the attendance in 1846, as compared with the amount of increase in 1845, might be fairly ascribed to the prevailing distress, which had compelled parents to obtain employment for their children on the public works. Many children, also, had been prevented from attending school by want of food and clothing.

4. From returns, then in our possession, we expressed our apprehension that, poverty and sickness among the humbler classes being then rapidly on the increase, there would be a much greater diminution in the attendance at the National Schools in 1847, than there was in 1846. Our fears have been realized; the number of children in attendance at our schools last year having been less by 53,778, than the total number on the rolls at the close of the previous year.

5. This decrease in the attendance, though large, is not so great as might have been anticipated, under the peculiar circumstances to which we have adverted. It has been caused

by the sufferings of the people. These sufferings, we trust, will soon pass away. The numbers in attendance will then, we expect, not only reach the point which they did in 1846, but will extend far beyond it. The average yearly increase in the numbers attending our schools, since our system came into full operation, to the end of 1846, has been 30,000. We feel confident that, as soon as the country shall have been restored to its usual condition, our schools will present fully as large a yearly increase in the number of pupils, as has taken place at any former period.

6. We have ascertained that this diminution was not confined to any particular province, but extended over the whole country, though it was greater in those districts in which poverty and disease most generally prevailed. In the subjoined Return we have given the number of children on the rolls, as returned by the Managers, and authenticated by their signatures, for the respective half-years, ending the 30th of September, 1846 and 1847; the decrease in each province. for the latter half-year, and the average decrease in each school.

7. In addition to the 3,825 schools in operation, there are 289 towards which, at various times, we have made building

*The attendance in the new schools, taken into connexion, during the three months, between the 30th September, 1847, and the 31st of December, was 5,373, which, being added to 397,259, the number on the rolls, upon the 30th of September, makes the whole attendance, at the close of the year, 402,632.

+ There being an increase of 739 in the additional attendance upon schools, to which salaries were granted since the 30th of September, 1847, as compared with the corresponding period for the year 1846, we have deducted that number, making the total decrease in the year, 53,778,

grants; of these grants 39 were made during the past year, amounting to £2,594 10s. 10d. When these 289 schools shall have been completed, and in operation, they will afford accommodation to 27,096 additional pupils.

8. The number of schools struck off the rolls during the year, 1847, for various reasons specified in the Appendix, was 82; 14 others are suspended, which may hereafter be re-opened; and 224 new schools were added to the list. The total number of our schools, therefore, on the 31st of December, 1847, was 4,128, including those in operation, those suspended, and those towards the building of which we' have promised aid. The actual and expected attendance in these 4,128 schools, will be 429,728.

9. The following table shows the progressive increase in the number of National Schools, together with the number of children in attendance therein, from the establishment of our Board in 1881, to the 31st December, 1847.

10. We direct attention to the following summary, which will be found important, as exhibiting the number of National Schools in each province, and the number of children on the rolls for the half year, ending the 30th of September, 1847, distinguishing those schools which were in operation, those to which we have promised building grants, and those suspended.

11. We deem it of importance to observe that, notwithstanding the causes to which we have adverted, as having had an unfavourable influence upon the attendance at the National Schools in the last year, the number of applications for grants to establish new schools, though less than in the year 1846, was considerable, viz., 359. To 224 of these we gave the requisite assistance, either for building, or for salaries and books. The remaining 135 applications were rejected for various reasons, of which an official record is entered in our books.

12. Of these unsuccessful applications for salaries, the majority have been rejected, on account of proof not being furnished to us of the required daily average attendance of at least 30 pupils; of those for building grants from the insufficient title in respect of the land on which the school was proposed to be erected; or from the unsuitableness of the site from its not being, for example, sufficiently central, from its contiguity to other National Schools, or from its being on Church or Chapel ground. We have at all times insisted, where it was possible, upon having sites for the erection of our vested schools unconnected with houses of worship. But where we have been convinced, not only by the statements of the applicants, but by the inquiries of our Inspectors upon the spot, that no convenient site, unconnected with a place of worship, could be obtained from the proprietors, we have yielded to the necessity, and accepted the site: were we to do otherwise, one of two things must inevitably happen, either that the district would remain without a school, and be deprived thereby of education, or that the school would, notwithstanding our rejection, be built

* There was, in addition to this number, an attendance of 5,373 children upon schools, to which salaries have been granted since the 30th September, 1847, making the total attendance on the rolls for that half year, 402,632.