1830
Scoil Naomh Buithe is at least the fourth school which has been set up around the crossroads. The location of the first is not entirely clear, but it had 68 boys and 36 girls on roll in 1830.
In January 1833 Fr. Torris PP applied to the Board of Education for aid to build a new school on a site on church grounds. The proposed school was to cater for 80 boys and 50 girls and it would cost £157. Following the school's move sometime before 1912 the old building served as a teacher's residence and it underwent a number of refurbishments. In 1962 it was sold back to the parish and is now the curate's residence.
1912
By 1912 the "new" school was operational across the road from its predecessor. It was situated in the triangle of land between the Priestown Road and the Paddock Road and is now a private residence. In January 1950 Fr. Ward recorded that there were 65 pupils on the rolls.
1963
In 1954 Fr. Bennett started a fundraising campaign for another new sTchool. Five years later a one acre site was purchased at a cost of £225 and in 1962 S. Kerr and Sons, Ardee, were appointed to build a new two roomed school at a cost of £8,000. The building was officially opened and blessed by most Rev. Dr. Conway on 18th April 1963. It then had 59 pupils on roll. As the numbers increased a prefab was added to the right of the school. When a second prefab was need in 1983 it was decided to extend the school.
1986
In 1986 a further two classrooms and a PE hall were added to the school. Over the course of the next year the two original classrooms were completely refurbished. The new buildings were officially opened by Séamus Kirk TD in October 1987 and blessed by Bishop James Lennon. The extension had cost over £200,000 built with a local contribution in excess of £20,000.
1994
In 1994 there were 112 pupils on roll in the school. This fell back to 90 by the year 2000, but in 2002 the number of pupils began to increase sharply and the need for yet another extension became evident. Permission for a four-
2010
This continued over a number of years until Sept 2010 when the Department of Education and Skills shelved plans for an extension and granted permission to begin architectural planning for a new eight- In the decade before the new school was built we had to use our PE hall as a classroom and we also needed to add three prefabricated classrooms and two prefabricated learning support rooms. Therefore we were very happy to move into our spacious new school in November 2016.
2014
During the Christmas season, we received tidings of great joy. On Thursday 18th December the Minister for Education and Skills, Jan O’Sullivan, announced that our new school had been granted approval to proceed to tender and construction with immediate effect. After a twelve year application and planning process this announcement was warmly welcomed by all in our school community.
The project is currently listed on www.etenders.gov.ie (ref 91130) and this tendering process is expected to be complete in April. All going well we look forward to seeing construction begin onsite before the Summer holidays.
2016
Moving into our new school building