The first purpose-built school in Castlepollard was a Church of Ireland parochial school built in 1818. The building of this school likely spurred on the serving parish priest to establish a school for catholic children. It was Fr. Walter Murtagh, a native of Oldcastle, who oversaw the building of the first catholic school in Castlepollard in 1848. It was built next to the Parochial house where the Men’s shed is currently situated.
The school had two classrooms , one for boys and one for girls. Essentially these were two separate schools. It was a stone-built building with a slated roof. It was 64 feet in length, 24 in width and 11 feet high. It was built at a cost of £242 of which £118 was raised through subscriptions. Despite its modest size, there were 135 males and 150 females enrolled in the school through average daily attendance levels were roughly a third of these figures. Michael Reidy was appointed as schoolmaster of the school and Mary Grace as school mistress.
The next major change happened in 1884 where a new infant school was added to the building at the rear of the boys’ school. Within the building then there were now six teachers working: two teaching the boys, two for the girls and two for the infants. Another room was added in 1909 when Fr. Gogarty was parish priest. The infant school was later amalgamated (1944) with the boys’ and the girls’ schools while the principal, Mrs. Davitt, became a member of the girls’ school staff.
Our current school building was erected in 1965 on a site donated by Donal and Mrs. Slattery. It took one year to construct and in late spring 1966, the pupils from the old school on Church Street relocated to their new school named St. Michael’s. The boys and girls school amalgamated in 1970 to form a mixed national school. An extension in the form of two classrooms, staff room and general-purpose room was added in the late 1970’s meaning there were then seven classrooms within the school and a general purpose room.
In late August 2021, we opened our first special class while a second class was opened the following year. Work on a two-class modular building commenced in January 2023. This building was opened in June 2023 to our two ASD classes. We have submitted an application to the DEY for a purpose-built two class ASD Base and SET room. We hope that we will move to tender and construction in the next few years, giving our school a more modern look.