And all it took was a global pandemic for teaching principals to get a day a week of Admin leave; what will need to happen before the posts of responsibility are restored? In this special episode, I review the several documents as quickly as I can to let you know what’s happening for primary schools … Read more
About a year ago, the Department of Education wrote to a load of schools in Dublin 15 to compel them to open Special Classes for Children with Autism. This was because the planning section of the NCSE hadn’t managed to organise the opening of special classes where there was the most need. Somehow, deals were … Read more
Ah, the Irish Education System! Overly complex, mired in historical precedence and no one really knowing who is responsible for who. And what better symbol for all the madness than the bus system in schools – known as the school transport scheme. In this episode, I’ll be trying to figure out school buses and if … Read more
There’s a line in Lou Reed’s Perfect Day towards the end, “You’re going to reap just what you sow” which is repeated until the song fades out and it couldn’t be truer for the Department of Education and their handling of the Coronavirus. In this special episode of If I were the Minister for Education, … Read more
For those of you unfamiliar with primary schools, you might be surprised to know that the Department of Education is not responsible for what happens in any of their schools. You may be further surprised to note that patron bodies also have no responsibility either. Every single primary school in the country is its own … Read more
The NCSE Annual Research Conference took place last week, which basically asked the question, is a fully inclusive school system right for Ireland? They brought over a number of people, including one Jody R Carr, the former Minister for Education of New Brunswick in Canada to talk about a full inclusion model, where all children, … Read more
The Irish Times had a headline a couple of weeks ago “Sharp drop in primary pupils using computers in school” which caught my eye. For those of you listening in the future, this headline was written in November 2019 – a time when technology use is ubiquitous in the world and usage in homes is … Read more
Junior Infant classes can be a bit of a mix with children ranging from very young 4 year olds to very old 5 year olds and the difference between them is easy to spot, in general. There’s also a very odd leap between pre-school and primary school in loads of ways – never mind the … Read more
Posts of Responsibility are promoted posts in Irish schools. During the recession, a moratorium was imposed on these posts. When they were to return, we were promised they would be revolutionised and made more relevant to 21st century leadership. Instead, nothing changed except for new labelling. In this episode, I’ll be exploring how we missed … Read more
The National Principals’ Forum was set up in 2018 to try and work with Department of Education to reduce principal workload. They have been trying their best to get the stakeholders that are supposed to be representing principals to represent principals. The group surveyed over 900 principals around the area of Special Education Provision. In … Read more