Marian College (Dublin) 3.32

Marian College is a Marist Catholic secondary school on Lansdowne Road in Ballsbridge, Dublin. The school motto is Optimum Optare - the pursuit of excellence. The school was founded in 1954 and has a student population of 413 boys and 12 girls. The main sports played are rugby, basketball and waterpolo.HistoryIn the early 1950s, the then Archbishop of Dublin, Dr John Charles McQuaid, had invited the Marist Brothers to open a school in the Sandymount-Ballsbridge area. This was in response to the opening of a co-educational school, Sandymount High School. Co-education was anathema to Archbishop McQuaid, so he wanted to provide a Catholic option beside it. The Marists found a beautiful site at Riverside House on the banks of the River Dodder and on 8 September 1954 the first pupils entered the Brothers’ house (Brian Nesbitt being the first student to sign up and later became a teacher at the school) to begin their secondary schooling. The Brothers decided to name the school Marian College as an acknowledgment of the special place of Mary in the foundation and traditions of the Marist Brothers and as an acknowledgment that the Church had declared 1954 as the Marian Year.Until 1999, Sandymount High School was next door to Marian College.For the first 34 years, the College was run by a succession of Marist Brothers. In later years, lay involvement in the management and organisation of the College has grown.