English Language Teachers in Primary Schools 26/02/09

Statement by John Carr, INTO General Secretary, on English Language Teachers in Primary Schools

26th February 2009
 
Education Minister does double U turn on language teachers.
 
The INTO described comments by the Education Minister today as a double u turn.
 
Last October the Minister announced that a ceiling of two on the number of language support teachers per school would be imposed, with some alleviation for the position of those schools where there is a significant concentration of newcomer pupils as a proportion of the overall pupil enrolment.
 
Since then, the INTO has continually criticised this proposal describing it as “vague, unspecific and non-transparent”. The union argued that the phrase “some alleviation” opened the door to political cronyism where TDs would be lobbying for appointments in certain schools.
 
Today in a first u turn, the Minister said his department was currently drawing up parameters for the allocation of language teachers, based on the needs of children and schools, and he said there would be no political interference. He said a first draft was prepared and a circular would be sent out to schools in the coming weeks.

However, in a u turn on the u turn, a clarifying statement from the Department said the circular would simply outline the Budget changes.
John Carr, General Secretary of the INTO, said his was not good enough. “Teacher allocations should be made according to an open and transparent formula that meet the needs of children and not through political patronage. It will take more than an assurance from Minister O'Keeffe to convince teachers that there there will be no politics in this process.”
 
Mr Carr went on to say that since last October the Minister had been releasing partial and incomplete information in order to understate the scale of the job losses in schools. “In October he claimed 200 jobs would be lost. This week he conceded that 382 schools would lose teachers on top of the 128 special classes and 60 disadvantaged jobs that are to be axed.”
 
According to the INTO the total of announced job losses now stands at 570. “Axing five hundred language teachers will put 1,000 newly qualified teachers on the dole queue instead of into classrooms,” said Carr. “What the Minister should do is reverse the budget cutbacks leave teaching positions intact.”
 
Ends.