Inspection Summary Report - St Canice’s Primary School, Feeny

St Canice’s Primary School, Feeny

DE Ref No 203-2263

Inspection Summary Report - September 2025

St Canice's Primary School is highly committed to its vision of creating a happy, caring, secure and stimulating learning environment in which all members of its community can grow spiritually, emotionally, socially and academically. The school’s vision is clearly articulated, inclusive, and actively embedded in daily practice.
The strategic development plan priorities, shaped through shared consultation, are clearly defined, highly relevant, and have led to measurable improvements across the curriculum. A balanced analysis of both qualitative and quantitative data informs the identification of areas for improvement, which are effectively implemented through phased and ongoing professional development.
A collaborative ethos underpins the school’s approach and is impacting positively on the children’s emotional health and well-being, ensuring that children are ready to learn and staff and families feel supported. This focus develops effectively the children’s confidence, resilience and readiness to learn.
The children are making very good progress in their learning with almost all children achieving expected outcomes or above in literacy and numeracy.
The children work very well collaboratively in pairs and groups and use resources effectively to support their learning experiences. They enjoy school and are happy in their learning.
Skilful staff deliver inclusive and targeted provision through focused interventions, supported by effective collaboration with external agencies. This ensures all children have equitable access to the curriculum, resulting in positive impact on their progress and learning.
The children are courteous, enthusiastic, and deeply proud of their own achievements and those of their peers. Their strong sense of belonging and affection for their school is evident in their daily interactions.
The children are given purposeful and meaningful roles that foster leadership, confidence and responsibility. They make valuable contributions to shaping their environment, demonstrating ownership, pride, and a clear understanding of their influence.
The proactive strategic focus on building the capacity of the leaders and staff at all levels ensures that they are highly skilled and work very effectively to meet the children’s individual needs.
The school has very good partnerships with parents, local schools, and the wider community. This has developed an inclusive culture of shared responsibility enriched learning, developing confidence and leadership, ensuring high-quality experiences for all of the children.
At the time of the inspection, the evidence provided by the school demonstrates that the arrangements for child protection align to the current statutory guidance.

Next steps

St Canice’s Primary School’s vision of nurturing confident, capable learners is realised through a collaborative, whole community approach that successfully develops the children’s emotional health and well-being. In a rural context, the children, staff and families work together to embed inclusive initiatives that enrich learning and ensure all of the children are successful learners and enabled to ‘SPARKLE’.

As set out in the school’s current development plan, the next steps for St Canice’s Primary School are to take forward the following area for action:

the continued development of the children’s digital skills across the curriculum.

The District Inspector will monitor the school’s progress in addressing the area for action as part of ETI’s normal monitoring processes.

Inspectors identified aspects of highly effective practice from which others may learn. The aspect of practice which should be shared more widely is:

the collaborative and strategic approach to nurturing the emotional health and well‑being of all the children and developing resilient and confident learners in an environment where every child is recognised and valued.