Roscommon primary school could be closed for the rest of this week

A County Roscommon primary school will most likely only be able to reopen next week due to loss of electricity.

However, the school community of Curraghboy NS is rallying together to maintain learning and a sense of normalcy. The thriving South Roscommon school has three mainstream teachers, one special education teacher and three special needs assistants.

After closing on Friday due to the red weather warning, the school was due to reopen on Monday.

Principal Rory Leonard called to the 36 student school on Sunday evening and was delighted to find it had power and was ready for students and staff the following day. Unfortunately on Monday morning the power had been lost.

“I came in at 8.20 that morning and there was no power,” he said. Lack of phone coverage also hampered efforts to let parents know, he added. “The last update I got from the ESB was that it will be Friday at quarter past one before it comes back, so you’re looking at a Tuesday return to school, if we’re lucky. I have notified the parents of that as well.

“What upset me was on Monday there was a lot of houses without power and I was delighted that I was open for those children, so that they’d have somewhere to come in and have light and heat. And then when I arrived in I was so dismayed.” He said that there was power in the village of Curraghboy on Saturday “but some houses are still without power”.

“I was on to the ESB on behalf of some of the residents to say that there was some trees on top of power lines,” Mr Leonard said. “There’s a trickle of power coming into some houses, they’ll have power for an hour and a half, and then go again.” This morning Mr Leonard and the other members of staff at the school were able to distribute workbooks to the students.

“Myself and the staff explored all options to get the school opened. We were going to get a generator but they couldn’t be got,” he said. “We explored using the local handball alley but it wasn’t quite suitable for our needs. We also explored going online but that would leave out some students who had no power.” 

On a positive note Mr Leonard said that the school would soon be getting solar panels in the near future.