A new government was formed in Ireland today and we got a new Minister for Education. It’s Richard Bruton. He has moved from the portfolio of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation. He takes over from Jan O’Sullivan, who has left education in a bit of a mess, with several ballots for industrial action going on and an awful … Read more
After the Celtic Tiger and the country went bankrupt, the government had to save money and make cuts to education. Because they have less of a voice, they cut from the most vulnerable people in our society. Over the last few years, they made cuts to children from EAL and Traveller backgrounds. They cut as much as … Read more
While most people have very little sympathy with teachers when it comes to pay, like everyone else, most teachers were hit very hard in the recession years, with some teachers losing up to 30% of their pay. On top of this, almost all allowances were cut and there were pay freezes. Furthermore, anyone who graduated … Read more
I won’t be voting for a party based on promises of reducing class sizes but it seems to be the thing that politicians believe is the number one issue in education. Ultimately, once one hits around 18 pupils, anything above that has little impact, i.e. the difference between 30 and 25 is negligible. Anyway, despite … Read more
As we come up to the General Election, I’m looking at the various parties and their stances on aspects of primary education. While I am personally very glad that religion in schools is top of the list in terms of public interest, I know that most primary teachers don’t believe it is the biggest issue facing us. … Read more
Over the coming weeks, we’ve decided to focus in on some of the issues facing Irish Primary Education in the run up to the General Election. In all the excitement, sometimes it’s important to set a context and thanks to Voices For Teachers and their members, a list of all the cuts to education are … Read more