There has been strong demand for the nursery's 26 full-time equivalent places and there are now six children on the waiting list. Demand has come from parents across Glasgow and western Scotland as far away as Ayrshire, according to Annrose Bisset, the nursery's director.
'Some of the parents speak Gaelic themselves and almost all of the parents will send children to a Gaelic school. One parent does not speak Gaelic but is going to take up classes,' Ms Bisset said.
'Recruitment has not been easy because there are lots of people who speak Gaelic, but not as many who read and write it,' she said. 'But we have done well, we have five people and just need one more.'
Christine Higgison, Glasgow City Council head of primary schools, said, 'The council has five Gaelic nurseries and two nursery classes in Gaelic in a primary school developed in 1995. But parents have made representation for birth to three care and we did not provide that in either nursery or primary schools.'
The Scottish Executive has made it a priority for councils to offer Gaelic language education where there is the demand and parents request it.
'We have been working on this for a couple of years and we have got support for this from the Scottish Executive,' Ms Higgison said.
The nursery is a workers' co-operative operated from the college with the normal council support for the three- to five- year-olds, equivalent to five half days per week.
The Executive has providedspecific support to kickstart the service for children younger than three.
The aim was to help increase or maintain the number of Gaelic speakers in Scotland, which were now down to 66,000, Ms Higgison said.
She said the joint funding model seemed to work well. 'It is excellent.
Parents are delighted with it and the partnership it has with the college is very progressive.'
