Teachers have to take the pain too [clarechampion.ie]
- Published: 15 April 2010
It hurts me to say this but I believe that teachers – the people we depend on to educate our children and our grandchildren – have lost all credibility.
I say it hurts me because there is chalk in my blood. My father was a teacher and so was his sister. My own sister was a teacher. Three of my children are teachers. I even did a bit of teaching myself in another life. I would love to be able to say that some of my best friends are teachers. But they no longer are. I mean they are still teachers but they are no longer my best friends. We fell out because of my attitude to them. Hopefully, we will be friends again when they see the light.
I cannot for the life of me understand their attitude. Surely, they know that the country is broke. We all know it. We have to borrow heavily from abroad to pay their wages and the wages of other public servants.
And if they don’t accept the pay cuts imposed in the last Budget, we won’t be able to borrow any more to pay their wages. It’s as simple as that. Now, I have met some teachers who teach Irish but cannot conduct a simple conversation in that language with me. But I never knew there were teachers out there who cannot do simple sums. They can talk until the cows come home about the unfairness of it all and of how they are not to blame for the recession.
Full Story: www.clarechampion.ie
Landscape changes as education reform moves forward [anphoblacht.com]
- Published: 15 April 2010
The ambitious reform of the education system in the Six Counties, driven by Sinn Féin, has made several decisive political steps forward in recent months. On 1 March the North’s Commission for Catholic Education published its post-primary review reiterating its position that academic selection should be completely phased out of Catholic-sector schools by 2012.
The Catholic Church has held a longstanding position of opposition to the discriminatory practice of testing children at the age of 10 or 11 to determine the type of post-primary school they will attend. However, this review (and its complementary area reports) for the first time outlines specific proposals as to how schools in a given area can make the transition to area-based planning.
Full Story: www.anphoblacht.com
Email told pupils their throats would be slit [IrishExaminer]
- Published: 15 April 2010
SCHOOLS and parents have been urged to ensure young children are fully aware of the internet’s dangers after a group of 11-year-old girls were emailed anonymous messages claiming their throats would be slit.
The violent message was sent to three fifth class students at St Aidan’s primary school in Enniscorthy, Co Wexford, on Monday.
In a graphic threat, it warned that the email’s recipients would be killed unless they forwarded the message, claiming their throats and wrists would be slashed and their eyeballs removed if they did not comply.
Full Story: www.irishexaminer.com
John Walshe: Early school leaving has its roots in experiences of academic failure and struggle at primary level [Independent.ie]
- Published: 15 April 2010
FOUR- and five-year-olds love school. They troop off in the morning all excited and come back home in the afternoon, full of the joys of learning.
But what happens along the educational way over the years that causes so many to switch off and drop out early?
You have to wonder what school experiences, for instance, occurred to the young person who told Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI) researchers: "I was just sick of it, I just didn't like the people or the teachers, it was like prison or something -- just, the rules in it, the teachers in it, the people in it that I didn't get on with. I'd done fourth year, but I missed a load of days and then was just, like, I started getting bored with it."
Full Story: www.independent.ie
Bottom of class for dropouts [Independent.ie]
- Published: 15 April 2010
DESPITE vast amounts of money having been thrown at the problem, children are still dropping out of school at an alarming rate. Many years of failure to stem the tide threaten to make a mockery of the country's aspiration to a future 'knowledge society'.
A study by the Economic and Social Research Institute has given us an insight into why one in six students quit secondary before sitting the Leaving Cert.
Quite simply, it is because they detest school.
Full Story: www.independent.ie
