IPPN

Published: 09 December 2008

Source : Irish Times

SEÁN FLYNN EDUCATION EDITOR

Tue, Dec 09, 2008

It was the biggest education protest in the history of the State, reflecting seething anger about the Budget cuts. But the huge success of Saturday's march was the culmination of a skilfully organised campaign over several months

AT AROUND 2pm on Saturday, the education protest march finally made it to Dublin's Merrion Square. Various education leaders - trade unionists, school managers and parent groups - took their place on the platform outside Government buildings. As they surveyed the huge crowd, they could scarcely believe their eyes. There were tens of thousands of protesters, over 50,000 in all, stretching far into the distance.

What was most impressive on Saturday was the huge number of ordinary citizens - parents, office workers, hospital staff - who had gathered to show solidarity. The protest was compared to the Teachers United campaign which mobilised over 20,000 to Croke Park in 1985.

But this was different. In 1985, it was exclusively teachers marching in support of better pay. On Saturday, it appeared every section of society had been galvanised into action by the Budget cutbacks.

It was the mean-spirited and scattergun nature of the Budget cutbacks that was the catalyst for action. The October 14th Budget didn't just increase class size; it cut into a range of programmes designed to help disadvantaged kids, newcomer children and those with special needs.

The Budget offended ordinary people and trampled on the aspirations they hold for their own children. On Saturday, parents told how they needed smaller, less crowded classes for their children. Protesters from eastern Europe told how the cuts in language support would damage their job prospects.

Saturday's march was the culmination of a protest campaign over two months, which drew over 35,000 people to the streets of Galway, Tullamore, Cork and Donegal.

The campaign swung into action within days of the Budget. John Carr, the INTO general secretary was a key figure. For the INTO, reductions in class size have been its main policy focus for years. Ireland has the most overcrowded classrooms in the EU.

Carr was reassured by a pre-Budget meeting with Minister for Education, Batt O'Keeffe and his officials. Class size might not be reduced in the Budget but it certainly was not going to increase; that at least was the conclusion the INTO drew from the meeting.

Carr found out about the Budget decision to increase class size in Buswells Hotel beside the Dáil on Budget Day. For him, the implications were clear; over 1,000 teaching posts would be lost at primary level and the quality of education would be severely damaged. No other front line service was asked to take a similar hit, he says.

The sense of outrage was just as keen at second level, where 800 posts would be lost and key programmes left without funding. School manager groups, not noted for hyperbole, warned of "chaos"' in schools.

An initial protest march - hastily organised to support a Labour Party motion on the cuts - attracted an impressive 8,000 protesters to the Dáil. Now, the challenge was to roll out a nationwide campaign of protest.

Within a fortnight of the Budget, teacher unions, school managers and parents managed to forge an alliance. All three teaching unions - the INTO, the ASTI and the TUI - established small groups to run the joint campaign. The Irish Federation of University Teachers (IFUT) also joined the new group, now called "Schools United".

The presidents of the three teaching unions - Declan Kelleher (INTO), Pat Hurley (ASTI) and Don Ryan (TUI) - were key figures in building support for the rolling series of protests which began in Galway seven weeks ago.

Other key figures included Paul Rowe of Educate Together (an influential voice among primary school managers) and Ferdia Kelly, who represents school management in over 400 secondary schools.

The new Partners In Education Group - uniting the National Parents Council (post-primary) with teacher unions and school mangers also helped to build the campaign.

The INTO, in particular, was well primed for the campaign. In many respects, the current protest is a re-run of last year's INTO campaign against class size, which drew more than 18,000 to 30 protest meetings. This forced a Government U-turn on the issue - and a commitment to smaller classes in the run-up to last year's election.

This year, the protest campaign built up considerable momentum as it progressed. Over 8,000 attended the first march in Galway, but by the time it reached Cork a fortnight ago,there were 20,000 people on the streets.

The teacher unions say that Batt O'Keeffe proved to be their best recruiting sergeant. Says one teacher leader: "When he accused us of scaremongering, it really motivated people to get out and protest. And when he said teachers were abusing sick leave on Mondays and Fridays, the campaign went into overdrive."

Those involved in the leading the campaign say it was the involvement of ordinary outraged citizens that has given the campaign its lifeforce. There is a real sense, says one, that teachers, parents and the whole community are on the one side ... fighting to protect our children."

© 2008 The Irish Times

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Published: 09 December 2008

Source : Irish Times

GIVE ME A BREAK:ON THE DART the other day I heard a man and a woman conversing in Irish - gossiping, flirting a little, sharing news, writes Kate Holmquist

Their conversation was lilting, sparkling language at its best. In my office, those who speak the language sometimes take phone calls in Irish or share a few words across desks. To hear Irish spoken naturally and with pleasure is a delight. But to hear it forced and stilted, to struggle over it as the children do homework they barely understand, while I, the parent who is supposed to help them, understand even less, is the opposite of pleasure. Spoken by choice, the language blossoms; learned by force, it shrivels and is hard to crack. While I appreciate the language, I abhor the educational apartheid that goes along with it.

The fact that children in Irish-speaking schools - some who already come from Irish-speaking backgrounds - get extra marks in the Leaving Cert is a scandal. Students in Irish schools doing their exams through Irish enjoy positive discrimination, with an advantage in the Leaving Cert of up to 10 per cent of their original result, and that puts children in English-speaking schools, from English-speaking and immigrant families, at a disadvantage.

In the league tables of "feeder schools" published in The Irish Times last week, seven of the top 25 feeder schools (fee-paying and non-fee-paying) were Irish-speaking, while 14 of the top 25 non-fee-paying schools were Irish-speaking. You don't have to be able to speak Irish to figure out that if you want to give your child the best chance of getting into university and still be able to afford a holiday, you send them to a non-fee-paying Irish school, which requires living near an Irish secondary school, often in counties Cork, Donegal, Mayo or Kerry, the heartlands of Irish-speaking privilege. But you don't have to be outside Dublin - two of the highest-scoring Irish-speaking schools are in Stillorgan, Co Dublin, where relatively privileged families make the most of the Department of Education's 10 per cent Leaving Cert points bonus.

Not only will your child be surrounded by mostly middle-class children and get the 10 per cent bonus, but he or she will also be likely to have smaller classes, aiding performance in other subjects. Every year, the Leaving Cert students with the most As come largely from Irish-speaking schools.

This is positive discrimination, and it wouldn't be tolerated anywhere else. Can you imagine the uproar if the Department of Education awarded an extra 10 per cent to English-speaking students doing their exams through French or Arabic of Mandarin. There is an apartheid between children who go to Irish-speaking schools and those who don't, which is why Irish should be taken off the compulsory curriculum in secondary school and ranked with French, Spanish, German and Mandarin as a subject to choose, with no extra points. Why should learning maths, geography and home economics through Irish give anyone a better chance of getting into medicine or law? If students want to study Irish as a second or third language, then let them, but in a global Ireland where students of various backgrounds are competing, why should those from Irish schools have the advantage?

The facts speak for themselves. Students from Irish-speaking schools are more likely to get on the university course of their choice, whether it's law, medicine or the arts.

Non-Irish-speaking secondary-school students are aware of their disadvantage. It's got to the stage now where having dyslexia is considered an enviable bonus among secondary-school students, because it exempts these students from having to do Irish. Dyslexia is linked to creativity and coping skills, and if your child is going to have a "special need", it's the one to pick. But there are children with dyspraxia, ADHD and other neurological disorders who have similar difficulties but are not exempt from Irish if they can show capability in English.

Parents and teachers have spent thousands of hours encouraging these children to communicate well in English, yet when they succeed, the children are put at a disadvantage by being made to study Irish. If only they'd written their letters the wrong way round and become exempt! While the department says that all children should learn Irish, the Irish-speaking schools have far fewer children with learning disabilities than other schools. The department's own audit showed few children with special needs in Irish-speaking schools - so are Irish-language schools weeding these children out?

But the best argument of all against the compulsory learning of Irish in secondary school is that we are a multicultural society where many languages are spoken. Those who speak Irish well are not the underprivileged, they are the privileged. For whatever reason, they go to Irish-speaking schools. But they have no more right to 10 per cent extra points in the Leaving Cert than do Muslim, French or Chinese children doing the Leaving Cert through English.

© 2008 The Irish Times

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Published: 09 December 2008

Source : Irish Times (Letters)

Madam, - The Minister for Education states (November 28th) that "If we are serious about being a knowledge economy, we must continue to invest." One wonders what he believes we should invest in. Clearly he doesn't think it is education. - Yours, etc,

PETER LYDON,
Clondalkin,
Dublin 22.

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Published: 09 December 2008

Source : Irish Times

Tue, Dec 09, 2008

TEACHER'S PET:Six years have passed since this newspaper first published its annual feeder school list or school league tables. At the time the publication of the list unleashed a wave of protest from the usual suspects in the teacher unions. These days, the annual feeder school list has become an integral part of the education calendar. Parents look forward to them, principals want to check on them, teachers want to peruse them.

Indeed, it was the huge popularity of the feeder schools list which prompted Mary Hanafin's decision to publish Department of Education inspection reports.

The methodology used for the The Irish Times list has changed over time. Schools are ranked on the basis of the percentage of pupils they send to college, rather than on a head-count basis. Virtually all third-level colleges on these islands are now included. Every effort is made to check and double check information culled from 50 separate lists and involving more than 700 schools.

But all of this is done on an unofficial basis by the media. The colleges themselves have no input into the compilation of such lists.

There has to be a better way. How about the seven universities compiling their own list in association with the CAO and releasing it officially? Other colleges could also compile and release their own lists.

At the moment, the colleges have the best of all worlds. They release the information to the media, get plenty of good PR, but take little responsibility for the manner in which it is used. This silly "hands-off '' approach to school lists should end - now.

• As Christmas exams approach, what is on the minds of every teenager in the country? If this reporter is any guide it is Chris Brown, the 19-year-old RB singer.

At 9am last Wednesday hundreds of school kids were queuing for tickets for his forthcoming Dublin concerts. Should they not be in school?

• Ferdia Kelly, general secretary of the group representing second-level school managers, deserves great credit for the compromise deal on substitution which averted potential chaos in schools next month.

For weeks, Kelly worked behind the scenes with Department officials before securing that key €2.7 million extra payment from Batt O'Keeffe.

And you can expect a similar deal at primary level. No one has the stomach for closing schools during this economic crisis.

© 2008 The Irish Times

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