IPPN

Statement by John Carr, General Secretary,
Irish National Teachers' Organisation, on Special Needs Education

8 May, 2005

INTO welcomes significant increase in resources for special needs pupils

The Irish National Teachers' Organisation warmly welcomes the announcement by Ms Mary Hanafin, Minister for Education and Science of significantly increased resources for children with special needs. This is a substantial investment in the education system, providing a vital service for those children most in need. It demonstrates clearly the commitment of the Minister for Education and Science to increased fairness in the education system by targeting increased resources where they are needed. For this, Minister Hanafin deserves great credit.

The INTO told the Department of Education and Science in February 2004 that a thousand extra teachers were needed to provide for special education in mainstream primary schools. A year ago 350 posts were announced by the former Minister for Education and Science. Soon after coming into office Minister Hanafin expressed concerns about children losing resources and ordered a review of special needs provision. The INTO was consulted at all stages of the review which has been completed within six months.

As a result an extra 650 teachers are to be provided bringing the total in the area of special education to nearly twelve hundred extra teachers. This is made up of 350 teachers announced last April, an additional 173 that were put into the system earlier this school year and today's announcement of 650 extra teachers.

This is a major investment by the government in the social fabric of the state. It provides the resources to enable special needs children not just to attend but to make real progress in school. In this way the Minister for Finance has built on his budget strategy to provide increased resources for persons with disability. It is a progressive and forward thinking development that provides for increased equality of opportunity. It is the biggest annual investment by the state in special needs education to date. Today is a good day for government and a good day for special needs children and their families.

This announcement for the first time provides a vital framework for the allocation of resources to schools. The new framework also has the potential to substantially reduce the bureaucracy associated with accessing resources and should therefore reduce the administrative burden on school principals. It provides real back up to the Education for Persons with Special Needs Act and the recently established National Special Education Council.

Growing bureaucracy, non-educational tasks and ever-increasing legislative demands are preventing principals from addressing their key responsibilites of managing teaching and learning in our primary schools. The serious problem of work overload amongst Ireland's Primary Principals is having such a devastating impact on their personal lives that many want to be relieved of their positions, according to research to be published at the IPPN Annual Conference in Dublin.

A survey of 850 members of the Irish Primary Principals' Network (IPPN) revealed that 75% of respondents felt they were either overloaded or seriously overloaded with work. As a result most are suffering from stress. Exhaustion, burn-out, migraine, tiredness, anxiety, a sense of hopelessness and difficulty sleeping were some of the emotional and physical problems being experienced by a large number of principals. Many were concerned with changes to their personality resulting from the stress, such as intolerance and irritability.

As a result of this survey the President of the IPPN Virginia O'Mahony is calling on the Minister for Education and Science, Ms. Mary Hanafin to take swift action to help alleviate the problem. "This is an extremely serious situation which was recognised by the Minister's Department in the setting up of a Working Party on Principals'Work Overload last year," she said. " However immediate reaction is required and our Principals have outlined practical measures which can, and should, be taken to ensure that they can get back to their main tasks and work more effectively. Other improvements in education cannot be realised if the leadership role of Principal suffers from overload."

The first ever survey of it's kind, this research by the IPPN highlighted a number of causes of the work overload. These included:

• Non-educational tasks
• Paperwork from the Department of Education and Science and other agencies
• The demands of Special Education Needs
• The conflicting demands on teaching Principals between class teaching and school leadership
• Lack of resources including IT, secretarial, caretaking, Special Needs Assistants, resource teachers, physical working space
• People management issues including staff under-performance, disruptive pupils, Boards of Management and parents
• Lack of support from the In-School Management team
• Unplanned interruptions from salespeople, parents, social workers, doctors, Departmental staff and other calling without an appointment
• Legal/litigation culture

The survey found that the most serious impact of this work overload was felt by the Principals themselves rather than the schools. It found that "almost every principal mentioned stress as a consequence of their workload. While this is inevitable in most jobs, particularly the professions, most principals say they are suffering far more from stress than at any other time in their career or lives. "In many instances, stress goes hand-in-hand with other problems, is made worse by other problems or indeed causes or exacerbates health problems. A worrying number of principals have been advised by their GP to take sick leave in order to protect their health. "Several respondents said they would 'hand back the keys in the morning' if they could, that they are 'at the end of their tether', 'hanging on by a thread', 'not sure how long more they can last', 'looking forward to early retirement'. They feel very 'isolated', 'alone', 'exposed' and they no longer enjoy the job they felt so positive about a number of years ago.

A number of key recommendations aimed at dealing with the problems were reached during the survey process. These included:

The reduction of the point at which an administrative principal is appointed from 180 to 150 pupils
That teaching principals would be entitled to a minimum of one release day per week
Deputy principals in schools of 16 teachers or more to be released from teaching duties.
Teaching principals to be able to undertake resource/learning support teaching roles
When new DES circulars are issued, where additional workload is implied for principals, the necessary human resources (teacher non contact hours) to be allocated accordingly
The management of special education needs to be delegated to the deputy principal or to an assistant principal where relevant
The DES and other relevant agencies to provide dedicated, authoritative e-mail query lines for principals seeking information or interpretation of circulars, policy documents and procedures
Principals to be appointed on a seven/ten year contract as per Green Paper, 1992
Current serving principals to be offered 'step down' facility without loss of seniority, salary allowance and related pension benefits. As in the case of early retirement, a quota of places to be allocated following assessment of annual applications.
Every principal to have access to full time secretarial support.

The report drew the conclusion that the "consistency and depth" of the feelings expressed in the survey does not bode well for the future of principalship in Ireland if something radical is not done to improve the situation."

Principals plead to be allowed return to their core responsibility - leading the quality of teaching and learning in their schools.

Ends
Full survey report available on request.