Silver lining for Shercock students

The outraged parents had claimed that their children were being “discriminated against” after they failed to secure ‘concessionary’ tickets on the bus to Kingscourt.

The pupils attend Coláiste Dún an Ri in Kingscourt and have been declined ‘concessionary’ tickets due to a lack of places on the bus. They don’t automatically qualify for a seat because the Kingscourt school is not considered geographically closest to their home addresses.
Sharon Lynch’s son is due to start first year. She told the Celt that Shercock NS is a nominated feeder school into Kingscourt and, as such, the students should be entitled to the places. “We could have enrolled in any of six schools in four surrounding towns. Shercock is bang smack in the middle of all these schools. We went off and chose Kingscourt,” she said.
Some of the parents concerned had actually paid the fee for the concessionary ticket only to be told two weeks before the start of the new term that there was no place on the bus for them and refunds would be issued.
“We were left in a situation that we don’t know how to get our children to school,” said Sharon.
Another parent, Tara McCabe, has a daughter going into second year. “Last year we were concessionary and got a seat on the bus – this year being concessionary again, we were refused,” she said.
“We need a seat on a school bus. Why should it be such a big deal to put a bus on? We are not asking for it free. We are paying for this service,” added Tara.

 

Breakthrough

However, it’s understood that yesterday the parents received email communication from Bus Éireann stating they were in a position to offer the students seats on an alternative school transport service.
Route A53 departs Shercock at approximately 7:45am serving Kingscourt.
The parents are now seeking a meeting with Bus Éireann on the issue to avoid a repeat of the stress next year.
Sharon Lynch is seeking the meeting between Bus Éireann, the school and the Shercock students after the Christmas break “to look at logistics for the coming years as we do not want to be in this situation at this time next year”.
Jane Ritchie is another of the parents affected. Her children attended Cabra Central School, which is also a feeder school for Colaiste Dún an Rí.
“My three children have three eligible tickets to Cabra Central School on CIE transport. I went to enrol my daughter in Colaiste Dún an Rí and, after the enrolment evening, they said to contact Bus Éireann to see where our local school was,” she said.
Courtesy of representations by Minister Heather Humphreys, Jane got a surprise reply that they were only eligible for St Aidan’s in Cootehill.
However, in April, when Jane was applying for the bus ticket online, the Bus Éireann website indicated that Bailieborough Community School was their closest option.
“I have no problem paying for the bus ticket. I can’t understand in this day and age that they can’t put on a bus to bring everyone to Kingscourt. We may have to now think about car pooling and there is the huge issue of insurance,” she added.
 Jennifer McEvoy expressed relief at the temporary resolution. “We would like our children to be facilitated on this bus, until this creaking system is fixed,” she said, pointing out that they could have ended up “driving behind a bus to Kingscourt, which had around 40 vacant seats.”
Local politicians had also made representations to Bus Éireann on behalf of the parents, together with the school.