Archives: Captivate Podcasts

Class Size seems to be a subject that has a universal agreement in terms of an answer – smaller class sizes are better – but is this true and are we even asking the right question?

This episode is partially inspired by two news stories: one where a child hospitalised two members of staff and his expulsion was overturned through an appeal; and one where a study basically lambasted schools for shortening children’s school days.  In this episode I wonder how has it suddenly become acceptable in any way to be … Read more

To celebrate 6 months since I started this podcast, If I were the Minister for Education investigates the scandal in the public sector where firemen have to make reindeer food to pay the heating bills and judges in the High Court dress up as Disney Princesses to plug the gap in their fundings. It would … Read more

In Ireland, about 12% of schools receive a grant to provide a school lunch for its pupils in a scheme that has changed little since 1914. Recently the government started a pilot to provide hot meals to 36 schools (about 1%)  In this episode I chart the history of free school lunches and see who … Read more

In this special episode, I do a live analysis of the new exemption from Irish circular that came out on 28th August 2019. I go through the changes, the effect of yet another offloading of responsibility to schools, and the expected increased workload for principals.

Of all the most baffling aspects of church involvement in education, the one that bugs me most is when a secular institution actively supports it. Not only did DCU agree to allowing Protestants a different entry route to their Teacher Training course through separate CAO points, they actually requested for it to continue in 2018.  … Read more

Why has the government or any of its agencies created so few resources to help us teach the curriculum, and if they did, what should they do? Episode 23 of If I were the Minister for Education explores how the government could provide teachers and students with adequate learning resources.

The NCCA are doing some interesting work in the background trying to restructure the curriculum given the number of demands on our time. Everyone knows that it’s impossible to fit everything into the few hours a week we get to teach and many subjects are simply not being taught enough or at all. In this … Read more

As if the 1999 English curriculum wasn’t bad enough, the new Primary Language Curriculum did the unthinkable and was even worse. In this episode, I discuss why we have the new Primary Language Curriculum and how it all went wrong from the very start.

In this final part of this episode on small schools, I finally come to some conclusion around saving small schools. I take all the evidence I’ve built up over the month and see if anything that anyone else has suggested has any merit. Ultimately, it comes down to a change in mindset.