Margaret Aylward founded St. Mary’s, Glasnevin, in 1873. The present Secondary School was opened in 1941 under the direction of the Holy Faith Sisters.
The central philosophy of St. Mary’s follows the central philosophy of the Holy Faith Congregation and in so doing it also follows the directives of the 1998 Education Act in the following way – “St. Mary’s seeks to create a school community whose central purpose is the religious, moral, intellectual, human, social and physical-recreational education of the student.”