Sligo Grammar School is a private fee-paying

co-educational Mixed-sex education, also known as mixed-gender education, co-education, or coeducation (abbreviated to co-ed or coed), is a system of education where males and females are educated together. Whereas single-sex education was more common up to ...

boarding school A boarding school is a school where pupils live within premises while being given formal instruction. The word "boarding" is used in the sense of "room and board", i.e. lodging and meals. They have existed for many centuries, and now extend acr ...

located on The Mall in

Sligo Sligo ( ; , meaning 'abounding in shells') is a coastal seaport and the county town of County Sligo, Ireland, within the western province of Connacht. With a population of 20,608 in 2022, it is the county's largest urban centre (constituting 2 ...

. The school has approximately 450 students of which approximately 100 are boarders. It offers the traditional

Junior Certificate The Junior Cycle () is the first stage of the education programme for post-primary education within the Republic of Ireland. It is overseen by the Department of Education (Ireland), Department of Education and the National Council for Curriculu ...

and

Leaving Certificate A secondary school leaving qualification is a document signifying that the holder has fulfilled any secondary education requirements of their locality, often including the passage of a final qualification examination. For each leaving certificate ...

courses along with

Transition Year Transition Year (TY) () is an optional one-year school programme that can be taken in the year after the Junior Cycle in Ireland. However, depending on school population and funding it may not be available, and in other schools it is compulsory. ...

, which is compulsory. It is under

Church of Ireland The Church of Ireland (, ; , ) is a Christian church in Ireland, and an autonomy, autonomous province of the Anglican Communion. It is organised on an all-Ireland basis and is the Christianity in Ireland, second-largest Christian church on the ...

management.

History

The school has existed in various forms for over 400 years, its constitutions reflecting the changing outlook and needs for society. The present school incorporates part of the Charter School which was set up in 1752 under a Royal Charter, and which closed in 1843. The Diocesan School In Elphin, which numbered

Oliver Goldsmith Oliver Goldsmith (10 November 1728 – 4 April 1774) was an Anglo-Irish people, Anglo-Irish poet, novelist, playwright, and hack writer. A prolific author of various literature, he is regarded among the most versatile writers of the Georgian e ...

among its pupils, was moved to Charter School buildings in Sligo in 1862. In 1907, the school buildings were conveyed to the Incorporated Society who closed their boarding school at Primrose Grange under Knocknarea and built dormitories and classrooms (the present boy’s dormitories and "Prep Room") on the present site, of Sligo Grammar School. In 1947, Sligo Grammar School was merged with Sligo High School which was founded by Dean Ardill in 1911. The premises of the High School were closed and the residence known as the "Hermitage", adjoining the Grammar School, was purchased from the Campbell family to house the girl boarders. A new teaching block was added in 1971, and expanded in 1985 and 2002. In August 1976, the school was leased by the Incorporated Society to Sligo Grammar School Limited, which runs the school through a local Protestant board. "The Hermitage" was destroyed by fire in November 1976 and was replaced by a new residence in September 1978. An extension to the school, including more classrooms and a new library, was completed in September 2012.

Extracurricular

Sligo Grammar School have won the Connacht Schools Rugby Senior Cup 13 times, winning three consecutive titles in 2022, 2023, and 2024. The school also had a successful period, under the coaching of teacher Oliver Morris, in the 1999 and 2000 seasons. The school also has an athletics association and

hockey ''Hockey'' is a family of List of stick sports, stick sports where two opposing teams use hockey sticks to propel a ball or disk into a goal. There are many types of hockey, and the individual sports vary in rules, numbers of players, apparel, ...

teams for girls. There are also competitive debating teams in English, Irish and

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany, the country of the Germans and German things **Germania (Roman era) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizenship in Germany, see also Ge ...

. The school also has an

SATB In music, SATB is a scoring of compositions for choirs or consorts of instruments consisting of four voice types: soprano, alto, tenor and bass. Choral music Four-part harmony using soprano, alto, tenor and bass is a common scoring in classic ...

choir A choir ( ), also known as a chorale or chorus (from Latin ''chorus'', meaning 'a dance in a circle') is a musical ensemble of singers. Choral music, in turn, is the music written specifically for such an ensemble to perform or in other words ...

Notable past pupils

(1728-1774) - student of Elphin Diocesan School, which later became part of the Grammar School. * Jack B. Yeats (1871-1957) - artist * R. M. Smyllie (1893-1954) - former editor of ''

The Irish Times ''The Irish Times'' is an Irish daily broadsheet newspaper and online digital publication. It was launched on 29 March 1859. The editor is Ruadhán Mac Cormaic. It is published every day except Sundays. ''The Irish Times'' is Ireland's leading n ...

'' * Frank Wynne (b. 1962) - Irish literary translator and writer * Cathal Sheridan (b. 1988) -

Munster Rugby Munster Rugby () is one of the professional provincial rugby union, rugby teams from the island of Ireland. They compete in the United Rugby Championship and the European Rugby Champions Cup. The team represents the Irish Rugby Football Union, ...

player

References

{{Private schools in the Republic of Ireland Private schools in the Republic of Ireland

Grammar School A grammar school is one of several different types of school in the history of education in the United Kingdom and other English-speaking countries, originally a Latin school, school teaching Latin, but more recently an academically oriented Se ...

Schools with a royal charter Secondary schools in County Sligo