Irish Primary Principals' Network 4.10.2007

PRESS RELEASE

3,300 Primary Principals Facing Major Role Change

The Irish Primary Principals' Network (IPPN) is deeply concerned with the implications of negotiations currently under way between the Teacher Unions, Management Bodies and the Department of Education & Science.
"These negotiations propose that Performance Management of Teachers is added to the role of Principal. It is remarkable that IPPN, the professional body for Primary School Principals, has not been directly consulted. This proposed fundamental change effectively shifts responsibility for evaluating teacher performance from the DES Inspectorate to individual Principals. IPPN is fully supportive of any measures which lead to improving the quality of learning for all children, and we have called in the past for professionally appropriate systems to be put in place to deal with underperformance where it occurs." said Larry Fleming, President of IPPN, today.

It is incredible to discover that major additional responsibility is being proposed for the role of Principal at a time when:

• 3 out 4 Principals are still full-time class teachers,
  
• 4 out of 10 Principals do not have even a basic office,
  
• 2 out of 3 principals do not have a full-time secretary,
  
• and most of the non-educational management of the school has to be carried out by Principals due to increasing dysfunction in Boards of Management.
  

As a consequence of this severely under-resourced role, there is a growing recruitment and retention crisis for Principals with dwindling numbers of teachers applying for promotion to the role of Principal.

IPPN understands that the INTO, which represents Principals' conditions-of-service & employment issues, has in fact already agreed to the addition of Performance Management to the role of Principal. This has happened in the context of the National Social Partnership Agreement as outlined in the document "Towards 2016".

This Friday and Saturday the INTO holds their biannual Principals' Conference in Westport. IPPN expects that the INTO will fully inform Principals on all the implications of current negotiations, in the context of other pressing conditions-of-service issues, as well as the forthcoming Benchmarking report.

IPPN acknowledges that Performance Management has an Industrial Relations dimension but is fundamentally a professional issue. We fully expect to be consulted before any new arrangements are put in place.