Is the Irish boarding school becoming a thing of the past?

The announcement by the trustees of Glenstal Abbey last Friday that the boarding school on the grounds of the Co Limerick Benedictine monastery will close in the next two years has sent shock waves across the Irish boarding school sector.

With less than 25 such schools still operating in Ireland from a high of approximately 125 in the 1960s, there is a real sense that many Irish boarding schools are struggling to keep their numbers up to meet the high cost of looking after students in five-day or seven-day boarding.

“Seven-day boarding for the domestic Irish market is not required by families of students in 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th years. That’s the big change,” says Colm Maloney, president of Cistercian College in Roscrea, Co Offaly.

[ Parents and former pupils of Glenstal Abbey in bid to prevent closureOpens in new window ]

“But there is a lot of interest in five-day boarding and day-boarding with its access to study and on-site sports facilities and training for families with two working parents,” he adds. Seven-day boarding is still a draw for students in 5th and 6th year.

The Cistercian College in Roscrea (CCR) faced a similar situation to Glenstal in 2017 when the monks at the adjacent Mount St Joseph Abbey wanted to close down the school. At that time, a group of parents, former students and friends pledged almost €5 million in a few weeks to pay off debts and do essential repairs to the college. Five-day boarding and day boarding options were introduced to CCR then to attract more students. And as part of its continuing evolution, CCR opened its doors to girl day boarders in September 2026 after 120 years of being a boys-only school. Next year, the school will admit girls as residential boarders for the first time.

Offering more flexible boarding options – with some boarders even returning home during the week to play matches in local clubs or attend significant family events – and going coeducational are definite ways of making a school more attractive to boarders in the 21st century.

But looking at the bigger picture, there are several factors that have drastically changed the landscape for boarding schools in Ireland over the last 60 years. The first was the introduction of free secondary school education in 1967. Before that, many families saw boarding schools as their only option to get a good education for their children.

[ Irish interest in education is boarding on obsessionOpens in new window ]

Over the following decades, the number of community and comprehensive schools rose sharply countrywide, offering families high-quality secondary school education for their children on their doorstep. Some boarding schools run by religious orders also opted to close down their boarding facilities due to declining vocations and operate as day schools only. And the most recent census data suggest that numbers in post-primary schools countrywide will peak in 2026-2027 with a gradual decline in student numbers over the next five to eight years.

In the current Irish Times series on boarding schools, the principal of Kilkenny College – Ireland’s largest boarding school – said that families who would previously have chosen boarding schools now have more options locally. “A lot of our boarding families are from rural areas. They are ambitious for their children but with improvements in local schools and costs of third-level education – especially accommodation – they have other costs to consider,” says Kilkenny College principal Emma Raughter. Fees in Irish boarding schools range from €11,498 for five-day boarding at Newtown School in Waterford city to €25,000 for seven-day boarding at Clongowes Wood College in Co Kildare.

[ Inside Ireland’s only boarding school offering the Leaving Cert and International BaccalaureateOpens in new window ]

Kilkenny College chief executive Murt Larkin says that rising standards of living for many families also play a part in making boarding less attractive. “Most children live in homes with multiple bathrooms and toilets, so it is a harder sell now for parents to put their children in a dorm with shared showers and toilets,” he says.

The lack of home comforts – and the desire to be closer to their children in their teenage years – might prevent some families from choosing boarding schools, but access to high-quality sporting facilities and training, as well as supervised study and smaller classes, continues to attract families who can afford it.

“What boarding school offers is hard to replicate in a day school. Students live in a community where study, sport, music, drama and friendships happen in the same place, and they develop independence, resilience and the ability to live alongside others,” says Larkin.

Parents who enjoyed their boarding school experience are also more likely to send children to boarding school.

Many Irish boarding schools also welcome international students from across Europe, Asia, Africa and North America. Some of these students come for one year to improve their English, but others complete the senior cycle, offering them better access to universities here and across Europe. International students pay higher boarding fees, thus bringing much-needed income to boarding schools where numbers are declining.

Keith Lemon, principal at the Quaker-ethos Newtown School in Waterford, says that boarding schools still appeal to families who want a particular ethos. “The pressures on boarding schools are huge. It costs us the same to run the school for 80 boarders or 100 boarders, so every boarder helps,” says Lemon. Of the 86 boarders in Newtown School, more than half are from abroad, mainly Italy, Spain and Germany and in 4th, 5th and 6th years.

Lemon will attend the Affordable Boarding Show in London this weekend alongside representatives from Clongowes Wood College, Villiers School in Limerick and Kings Hospital in Dublin. “There is an interest among Irish expats, people with Irish descendants and connections to send their children to boarding school here,” says Lemon. With fees at Irish boarding schools a fraction of the cost of many private boarding schools in the United Kingdom, attracting even more international students might be a survival strategy for many Irish boarding schools. Representatives from domestic boarding schools also attend international education fairs as far away as Hong Kong to attract international students.

Colm Maloney from CCR predicts that a small number of boarding schools will survive into the future. “It will be the attention given to the individual student rather than class groups and [restrictive] policies on mobile phones which will be a draw for families to these schools,” he says.