IT Article - ‘Collapse’ in numbers applying for teacher-training courses

feardeas

Icsics wrote:

Yes, breaking one full time job into hours is definitely a problem. But as long as the P & DP is dependent on teacher nos & not student nos it's going to continue

Interesting, thought it was whole time equivalents, if not then it is a scandal on full.

r93kaey5p2izun

[URL] https://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=94993530[/URL]


P&DP salary depends on Whole Time Equivalents not just number of teachers employed so that's not the reason for splitting jobs.

It seems to me that management in a majority of schools have just been incredibly short sighted in seeing only the short term gains of the hours culture and haven't given much if any thought to the long term consequences. (I'm referring here to the undeniable practice of splitting jobs unnecessarily - not the situation of minority subject teachers on part time hours which is always going to be an issue).

I started a thread here about it before (see link above) to try to understand the rationale behind it and what research management were following that suggested this was a beneficial way to run schools. It's also something I have asked everyone I've come in contact with involved in managing and running schools over the past year. I've even asked our CEO. Incredibly it seems that there really is zero long term vision on this issue and that the short term benefits that come from being able to control desperate teachers lacking job security really was the only consideration all along.

userb

Yeap another great point there

Noveight

The 2 year Masters was the straw that broke the camels back when it came to driving people away from teaching. It'll be changed again before long once they realise that people just won't bite.

Over the course of the 2 years I'll have spent 44 weeks on school placement and 24 weeks in NUIG. Over the two years they're collecting 12k for 24 weeks of lectures/workshops and a few inspections scattered here and there, talk about lucrative!

It's no wonder the entry requirements have been consistently sliding lower and lower, they'll be begging people to sign up for a finish.

Seannew1

Noveight wrote: »

The 2 year Masters was the straw that broke the camels back when it came to driving people away from teaching. It'll be changed again before long once they realise that people just won't bite.

Over the course of the 2 years I'll have spent 44 weeks on school placement and 24 weeks in NUIG. Over the two years they're collecting 12k for 24 weeks of lectures/workshops and a few inspections scattered here and there, talk about lucrative!

It's no wonder the entry requirements have been consistently sliding lower and lower, they'll be begging people to sign up for a finish.

I'm one of the fools who stumped up for that course; If they do put it back to one year, I imagine the response we'd get if we asked to be re-imbursed!!

FA NG

Noveight wrote: »

The 2 year Masters was the straw that broke the camels back when it came to driving people away from teaching. It'll be changed again before long once they realise that people just won't bite.

Over the course of the 2 years I'll have spent 44 weeks on school placement and 24 weeks in NUIG. Over the two years they're collecting 12k for 24 weeks of lectures/workshops and a few inspections scattered here and there, talk about lucrative!

It's no wonder the entry requirements have been consistently sliding lower and lower, they'll be begging people to sign up for a finish.

Theyre supposedly introducing free springboard PME courses for home-makers.

https://www.rte.ie/news/education/2017/1020/913810-school-leaders-conference/

Can't see them reducing the masters to 1 year, too many people have already paid thousands for the new PME. Can you imagine the uproar it would cause? NQT's are already at breaking point with lack of permanent positions and reduced wages, id imagine that would push them over the edge.

amacca

Noveight wrote: »

The 2 year Masters was the straw that broke the camels back when it came to driving people away from teaching. It'll be changed again before long once they realise that people just won't bite.

Theres a lesson in that.....


Maybe if teachers stuck together and didn't bite when it came to other issues there would be a lot of other nonsense that the powers that be wouldn't attempt to foist on the profession.

deiseindublin

Yeah but the TUI folded early, and the anti democratic faction of the ASTI put paid to that.

ethical

Richard of Ed should cop on now and get teaching sorted! Give the two fingers to Paschal if needs be!
If only the Sh1theads at the top listened,there must be many methods to fix this problem.
How about the following as regards the 2 year Dip,keep it at 2 years BUT pay the student teacher for the teaching element on the second year,at least income would be provided and TAX would be paid(this should keep Paschal happy,if thats possible!).
How about phasing out (may not be the correct word!) any teacher with 30 years + service over a ,say,5 year period while the newly qualified Teacher takes over ,gradually,so that after the 5 years ,one teacher can retire gracefully having assisted a younger colleague to gain a permanent foothold in the profession.

Of course I do not expect this to even get consideration as some school managers are so far up their own HOLES that all they see is mé Féinism,cronyism and scratch my back and I'll scratch yours.It makes me sick to the bottom of my stomach the carry on that takes place in education management,and you can include ETBs and Voluntary Secondary schools in this.Forget the Unions, as they are no fcukin good at fixing anything!

userb

I agree pay the teachers for the second part of the year in the PME

rainbowtrout

ethical wrote: »

How about phasing out (may not be the correct word!) any teacher with 30 years + service over a ,say,5 year period while the newly qualified Teacher takes over ,gradually,so that after the 5 years ,one teacher can retire gracefully having assisted a younger colleague to gain a permanent foothold in the profession.

And why should teachers be put on the scrapheap at the age of 52?

How about schools have to justify why they are advertising contracts for low hours, and make changes so this is phased out instead? How about the government decreases the pupil teacher ratio so more jobs can be created and students can get the benefits of being taught in smaller classes? The amazing Finnish system is waved in front of us at every opportunity, why not bring our pupil teacher ratio into line with theirs and have a ratio of 11:1 in our schools instead of 19:1?

Noveight

I don't see a PME student ever being paid for school placement classes. That would mean either paying both the student and the class teacher or else taking money from the teachers wage to allow for the student, neither of which will ever happen.

In regards to money the best thing a PME like myself can do is be available for doing after-school study or cover the odd class that pops up here and there. It helps to keep petrol in the car.

ethical

Fair play Rainbowtrout I'm with you all the way but I was just seeing it from Paschals side!!! and we all know his ilk prefer dealing with money rather than people!

feardeas

I remember hearing a few years ago that the Department felt the cuts in pay etc would bite but that it would be a few years. I think it has happened quicker than they thought. The PME seems to be as someone said the final straw. If the lauded teaching council allow some kind of springboard thing to happen then they should be disbanded.

The Times, God bless them talk about a good starting salary, it is IF a teacher is on full hours. We all know that that was always hard come by at the beginning and it's twice as difficult now.

The department must also know of the huge increase in numbers at post primary that we are having into especially in Dublin and surrounding areas. This is a perfect storm in many ways.

A small part of me wonders if they're preparing the ground to give on the payscale.

JohnnyJohnJohns

It's not talked about as much but there is a similar issue in third level (In ITs at least)- in particular piecemeal contracts that in my experience create headaches all the way up the chain.

And for any teaching post you need a masters (realistically PhD) and at least 3 years experience. This puts the most suitable candidates in a field like IT on about 50-60k so they're not likely to jump into lecturing given the significant pay gap between that salary and point 1 of the AL scale. It's proving difficult to fill a number of posts in our department which is forcing a reliance on part time hours that are getting harder and harder to fill.

I don't envy management in the IT's right now, caught between a rock and a hard place when it comes to recruitment!

playedalive

Yes and I would be one of those that instead of applying for teacher training in Ireland, I went to the UK, well England where the system is in crisis and they are paying bursaries for shortage subjects like mine. €15,000 approx over 2 years with no way of or difficulty holding a part time job was the motivator for a career I always wanted despite many years in industry. With the introduction of everything synonymous with the English system, such as a strong/weak rating system, it seems Ireland will not learn from the English system. Though, you could agree Ofsted is a necessary evil. While the English system has its negatives, the major positives are a year's training, payment for it and good opportunities at getting a job and making a life. (leaving the workload and amount of assessment data collected through loads of testing and used to make teaching more corporate by establishing Key Performance Indicator and Targets.

Unless Ireland changes contracts and reforms work conditions, I shrug at thinking of the future. I doubt Ireland will do the Bursary thing, or the somewhat insulting Springboard course plan by Bruton.

doc_17

Part of me is delighted every time I hear about the teacher crisis (and yes, Minister, it is a crisis). Only when it bites hard will action be taken.

Seannew1

doc_17 wrote: »

Part of me is delighted every time I hear about the teacher crisis (and yes, Minister, it is a crisis). Only when it bites hard will action be taken.

Imagine if principals started ringing up parents at work to come in and collect their children, who cannot be supervised, without a teacher. There would be uproar.

evolving_doors

Seannew1 wrote: »

Imagine if principals started ringing up parents at work to come in and collect their children, who cannot be supervised, without a teacher. There would be uproar.

I'd say the default option prior to that would be to get someone in to just supervise (Secretary, SNA, caretaker, someone on the BOM, parents council, relatives).

Seannew1

evolving_doors wrote: »

I'd say the default option prior to that would be to get someone in to just supervise (Secretary, SNA, caretaker, someone on the BOM, parents council, relatives).

Johnny off the street could supervise too!

evolving_doors

Seannew1 wrote: »

Johnny off the street could supervise too!

As long as they have a pulse and vetted then everyone's happy.

And the next muddying of the waters will be "shur why don't the long term unemployed be put back to work with it". (Remember the lockout fiasco!).

But you will NEVER hear the current minister associate the shortage with pay. He's spun too far down the plughole to backtrack.

Mardy Bum

evolving_doors wrote: »

As long as they have a pulse and vetted then everyone's happy.

And the next muddying of the waters will be "shur why don't the long term unemployed be put back to work with it".

But you will NEVER hear the current minister associate the shortage with pay. He's spun too far down the plughole to backtrack.

The salary is now 6k more than it was 5 years ago. This will attract more people and it is no surprise the numbers applying decreased hugely in this time.

I wonder if we could get paid the 30k we were short changed over the last 5 years.

deiseindublin

Excellent letter from Áine Hyland in IT, no dramatics and spin, just cold hard facts. She's always level though.

No incentive for best and brightest to be teachers
High fees , inadequate pay and difficulty in getting a full-time post making it an unattractive career choice

Áine Hyland


Ireland’s stated objective, as set out in Minister for Education Richard Bruton’s recently published plan for edcucation , is to have the No 1 education system in Europe by 2026, and to be a European leader in Stem (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) education.

The plan also says if Ireland is to be at the forefront of the global technological revolution, we must be a leader in nurturing, developing and deploying Stem talent. If we are to achieve this objective, our young people must have access to top-quality education in the sciences and we must have an adequate supply of Stem teachers.

The current teacher shortage in some key subject areas, and the fall in applications for teacher education places, must cast doubt on our ability to achieve the Minister’s plan. At post-primary level, the number of graduates applying for second-level teaching courses has fallen dramatically in the past five years, culminating last year in what has been referred to as a “crisis” in teacher recruitment and retention.

This has not happened suddenly. In 2012, an international panel which reviewed teacher education in Ireland (Sahlberg 2012) found that “the academic standard of applicants (to teacher education courses in Ireland) is amongst the highest, if not the highest in the world”.

However, the report warned that there was an increasing reliance in post-primary schools on “out-of-field teachers” in some subject areas and advised that the supply of and demand for teachers should bemonitored continuously.

Unintended consequence
The report recommended that “appropriate databases and forecasting mechanisms are developed to ensure that an adequate supply of teachers with the required specialisms are in place” to avoid the increasing reliance on out-of-field teachers.

In 2015, a detailed study of teacher supply, Striking the Balance, carried out by a Teaching Council working group found a significant imbalance between teacher supply and demand in mathematics, Irish, biology, modern languages and home economics. The study recommended that steps be taken immediately to put in place a process for ongoing monitoring and forecasting of teacher supply and demand and recommended that a standing group, to include representatives of the Department of Education and Skills, the Higher Education Authority and school management bodies, be set up as a matter of urgency. To date, this has not been happened.

The crisis in attracting teachers is partly an unintended consequence of adding an extra year to initial teacher education courses arising out of the government’s strategy on numeracy and literacy in 2011. The new two-year programme Masters programme (PME) – which replaced the old nine-month H Dip – is expensive, costing over €12,000 for fees alone.

This a prohibitive for many students. A Stem graduate, who wishes to become a post-primary teacher, now has to spend six years in college, with no guarantee of a job after graduation.

Many schools are without a specialised Stem teacher (eg in physics) but can only offer a part-time post to such a teacher. Outside the main cities, there are many unemployed or underemployed Stem teachers who cannot survive on the salary available to them and so they emigrate or move to a job in industry where they are paid a more realistic salary.

The reduced starting salary for teachers (introduced in 2012) exacerbates the problem. The current starting salary for a full-time teacher is about €35,000; the hourly rate for a part-time teacher is €43 an hour. Bearing in mind that the average wage in Ireland is now €45,000 for a full-time worker and €16,000 for a part-time worker, it is not surprising that teaching is no longer the attractive and highly sought after profession it once was.

Solutions
Added to the costs of training, and the difficulty in getting a full-time post on graduation, a young teacher now has the added challenge of finding affordable accommodation in which to live, especially if he/she is offered a post in the Dublin area.

Because Irish-trained teachers are highly valued in other countries, it is not surprising that many of our best graduates emigrate to countries where the salary and employment conditions are considerably more attractive.

We cannot expect our brightest and best to embrace a teaching career if the costs of training are prohibitive, posts are limited and remuneration is inadequate.

The solutions are obvious. There should be a closer match between supply and demand. There should be financial incentives for students to undertake courses in subjects which there are shortages and for universities to provide such courses.

A system of optimising the use of specialised teachers should be introduced eg teachers of subjects which are in short supply should be guaranteed a full-time post even if this means sharing between schools. Remuneration should be such as to ensure that newly qualified teachers will not emigrate or leave the system.

The solution will require some additional financial investment on the part of government –but the long-term return on this investment will be more than worthwhile. We need to take action now before it is too late – a “wait and see” policy is not good enough.

Gaia Mother Earth

I'm hearing of unqualified primary school teachers being 'employed' in Sligo. I do wonder how hard some principals are looking for qualified subs though.

*Just an edit to this but I'm hearing that there were qualified teachers available (know one teacher personally who wasn't called) but the principal went with an unqualified sub for cover that day.

I hope some principals are not using the sub shortage as an excuse for nepotism and getting their relatives and cronies to work in schools as opposed to getting qualified teachers in but making out they rang teachers and couldn't get anyone else! When that's not the case.

userb

great letter by aine hyland

Noveight

Cracking stuff from Ms Hyland. Unfortunately “wait and see” is precisely the approach that’s being taken.

evolving_doors

deiseindublin wrote: »

Excellent letter from Áine Hyland in IT, no dramatics and spin, just cold hard facts. She's always level though.

The crisis in attracting teachers is partly an unintended consequence of adding an extra year to initial teacher education courses arising out of the government’s strategy on numeracy and literacy in 2011.

Am I reading that right? 1 extra year = better Numeracy and literacy outcomes!

deiseindublin

Doubtful.

TL17

Extra year has led to sort of shortage of teachers. And this sort of shortage is also result of new special needs model. next summer will be glut as usual.

There is no real shortage for meaningful work.
Plenty spailpin fanach work. day here and day there. But not REAL work. Many young teachers can't get long eough to do first part of dip.
So Relax.
There is no meaningful shortage

Mardy Bum

evolving_doors wrote: »

Am I reading that right? 1 extra year = better Numeracy and literacy outcomes!

If the year was spent improving subject knowledge rather than making rubbish posters about group work it might be actually useful.