Educate Together have lots of conferences throughout the year. There’s the main AGM where all members get to vote on the running of Educate Together and there’s the principals’ conference. There’s usually conferences on ethics and this is for boards of managements, principals, parents and teachers but Educate Together have never run a conference solely for its teachers. That is until now.
For those of you not in the know about Educate Together’s Ethical Education Programme, here’s some information from the conference web site.
Governed by the Educate Together Charter, all Educate Together schools are:
- Equality-based, i.e. all children having equal rights of access to the school, and children of all social, cultural and religious backgrounds being equally respected,
- Co-educational and committed to encouraging all children to achieve their potential
- Child/learner-centred in their approach to education,
- Democratically run with active participation by parents/carers in the daily life of the school, whilst positively affirming the professional role of the teachers.
In Educate Together schools Ethical Education is understood as education that helps learners develop a critical understanding of social, moral and ethical issues and standards.
Ethical Education aims to develop learners’ knowledge, skills, attitudes and behaviours in equality, human rights, justice and sustainability so that learners develop personally and spiritually, think critically, and are empowered to make a difference.
In Educate Together schools, Ethical Education is guided by core values including
Co-operation, Freedom, Happiness,Responsibility, Respect, Care, Solidarity, Equality, Human Rights, Inclusion, Diversity, Community, Democracy. These core values are made explicit and are truly lived in each Educate Together school community.
Learners in Educate Together schools follow an Ethical Education curriculum. However, Ethical Education is more than what is taught in the Learn Together Curriculum at primary level, or the Ethical Education Curriculum Framework at second-level. For Educate Together, Ethical Education is the whole school experience, encompassing ethos, values and curriculum.
It all starts on Friday, 20th November at 5:30pm with a keynote from Dermot Ferriter, the famous historian. It’s followed by a dinner. The next morning, there will be a Teachmeet hosted by Rozz and me! We’re thrilled to be taking part in Educate Together’s first ever Teachmeet at their first ever conference for teachers. After the Teachmeet there are plenty of workshops.
For anyone who is interested in presenting at the Teachmeet, you probably know the score, if you’re an Anseo.net reader but do get in touch with the ET national office to get your name down if you’ve something interesting about the Ethics programme that you’d like to share.
If you’re an Educate Together teacher, you’d be mad not to come along to this conference. This is about the only opportunity to learn about our Ethics curriculum and to network with other ET teachers. Make sure to sign up soon as places are running out.
