WHAT DO WE KNOW ABOUT LARGE SCALE IMMIGRATION AND IRISH SCHOOLS? ESRI Research Bulletin 2009/2/6

Smyth, Emer and Darmody, Merike and McGinnity, Frances and Byrne, Delma (2009) WHAT DO WE KNOW ABOUT LARGE SCALE IMMIGRATION AND IRISH SCHOOLS? ESRI Research Bulletin 2009/2/6. UNSPECIFIED.

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Abstract

The period since the 1990s has seen immigration into Ireland of a scale and speed unprecedented in comparative context. After decades of net emigration from Ireland, the strong economic growth of the last decade and resulting rapid immigration of non-Irish nationals from a wide range of countries has transformed Ireland into a country of net immigration. In recent years the inflow of migrants has become more diverse, with many nationalities represented, and return Irish migration declining from 50 per cent of the inflow in 1996 to less than 25 per cent in 2006. In little over a decade Irish society has become more diverse in terms of nationality, language, ethnicity and religious affiliation as the population share of non-national immigrants increased from 3 per cent in 1993 to 6 per cent in 2002 to 10 per cent in 2006. As a result, immigrant children are now reflected in the composition of the student body at both primary and second level. While a number of small scale studies have been conducted on the experiences of immigrant students in Irish schools, national level data on how immigrant students are distributed across Irish schools, and on their levels of knowledge of English, have not been available. A new study by the ESRI Adapting to Diversity* addresses this gap. Emer Smyth, Merike Darmody, Frances McGinnity and Delma Byrne conducted a nationwide survey of principals of primary and second-level schools. In addition, they carried out qualitative interviews in 12 case study schools. The study estimates that immigrant students made up approximately 10 per cent of the primary school-going population and 6 per cent of the second-level population in 2007.

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