Minister must ringfence funding for disadvantaged schools [labour.ie]
- Published: 21 September 2010
Labour Party Councillor and Sheriff Street School Principal Aodhán Ó Ríordáin, has again called on Education Minister Mary Coughlan to give an absolute unequivocal assurance that no cuts will be made to the DEIS (Delivering Equality of Education in Schools) status of educational disadvantage for schools and no curtailment of the School Completion Programme will be introduced.
Cllr Ó Ríordáin said: "A number of Principals involved in disadvantaged education have expressed fears to me - some have used the term 'terrified' - that the programmes that keep their heads above water may be cut.
"In the light of cuts in traveller education, the postponement of the EPSEN act, the cuts in disadvantaged grants for non-DEIS schools and the increase in class sizes, justifiable fears have arisen amongst those principals involved in the most courageous of educational work. However most were satisfied that their schools would be ring-fenced.
"Recent measures aimed at cutting services to children with special educational needs, including those in DEIS schools, have given rise to fears that, disgracefully, everything is currently up for grabs in the Department of Education. This may include the DEIS scheme and the Schools Completion Programme, aimed at tackling early-school leaving, despite the fact that both are vital to the future of children in our poorest schools.
Full Story: www.labour.ie
Teacher's Pet [IrishTimes]
- Published: 21 September 2010
An insider’s guide to education
- Minister for Education Mary Coughlan delivered her best speech since taking office at the Irish Vocational Education Association (IVEA) conference last week. Speaking without notes, the Minister gave the first sign she is prepared to be something more than a cheerleader for Irish education.
Echoing the words of former Intel chief Craig Barrett, she signalled that we should dust off any complacency about Irish education and aspire to be better. She also backed a move away from rote learning in our exams and towards more critical thinking. And she spoke in visionary terms about new methodologies and a streamlined education system delivering more from fewer resources.
What all this will mean for education policy is another question. Plans to reform the Leaving Cert are still on hold – for some bizarre reason Junior Cert reform has been given priority. And any drive for more efficiency would put the Minister on a collision course with the immensely powerful teaching unions.
Full Story: www.irishtimes.com
Not enough is being done to tackle bullying [IrishTimes]
- Published: 21 September 2010
TIME OUT: Phoebe Prince case highlights issue once again
THE DEATH in South Hadley of 15-year-old Phoebe Prince, and the classic aftermath of denial, secrecy, institutional silence and attempts to blame the victim, draws attention to the topic of bullying and how little progress has been made in tackling school bullying here.
Despite research since the 1980s highlighting the problem and proposing solutions, the issue of bullying arises again and again at tragic and starkly inevitable intervals when one more young life has been shattered or ended because of it.
Each decade, bullying finds more insidious means of expression. It shifts from playground to sports pitch, to journey home, to every minute of every day through new technologies that provide outlets for the bullies. It is a serious attack on the sufferer including physical assault, psychological mugging, mental battering and social exclusion.
Children suffer when they are bullied. It eats into their hearts, their trust in people, their belief that adults will rescue them, and their feelings of safety and security.
Full Story: www.irishtimes.com
Bullying in Ireland: 'Schools are in denial' [IrishTimes]
- Published: 18 September 2010
Bullying is much more common than many of us – including school principals and parents – would like to admit. Kate Holmquist talks to one girl who has lived through the nightmare
THE RELENTLESS bullying started in her first year in a mixed secondary school in Dublin. Ciara was branded a “loser” and a “nerd” because she was highly academic, small for her age, wore glasses and had braces on her teeth. She refused to conform to the girls’ style code of having a fake tan and straightened peroxide-blond hair – and performing sexual favours for boys. In first year.
Ciara believes she was picked on because she stuck by her morals. “I wasn’t drinking and smoking or flirting like a Playboy bunny . . . The bullies told me to kill myself . . . And I knew I couldn’t win with them.” The daily insults, which included cyberbullying, intensified in second year, and she had to leave school when the stress made her ill.
Full Story: www.irishtimes.com
€200m disadvantaged fund fails to improve reading and maths [IrishExaminer]
- Published: 17 September 2010
MORE THAN €200 million in funding given to schools to help disadvantaged pupils has failed to deliver progress on reading and maths among the students, the Department of Education has found.
Around €213m is being spent this year, up from €180m in 2005, on staffing and other supports for almost 700 primary schools and 200 second-level schools with the highest levels of poverty among their students.
The department has just completed an evaluation of primary schools with the heaviest rates of funding and extra resources to combat educational disadvantage
Full Story: www.irishexaminer.com
