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Are there any Christian Brothers left in teaching?

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  • 14-12-2020 2:48pm
    #1
    sggleeson
    Registered Users Posts: 15 ✭


    Specifically principles, or have they long gone?


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    #2
    [Deleted User]
    Posts: 0 ✭ [Deleted User]


    I can't be too pacific, but I believe they are principally six feet under.


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    #3
    RandRuns
    Registered Users Posts: 601 ✭✭✭RandRuns


    Deleted User wrote: »
    I can't be too pacific, but I believe they are principally six feet under.

    I'm not sure I sea what you mean.


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    #4
    John Hutton
    Closed Accounts Posts: 1,301 ✭✭✭John Hutton


    Long gone I think, about a decade ago there were still a handful, retired now I'd say.


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    #5
    Rrrrrr2
    Registered Users Posts: 982 ✭✭✭Rrrrrr2


    There was one aul psycho in the school I was in- long gone now I’m sure, I left early 00s. Very frustrated people with no social skills.
    Lot less of them left than nuns really


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    #6
    sggleeson
    Registered Users Posts: 15 ✭sggleeson


    RandRuns wrote: »
    I'm not sure I sea what you mean.

    Me either haha.


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    #7
    sggleeson
    Registered Users Posts: 15 ✭sggleeson


    John Hutton wrote: »
    Long gone I think, about a decade ago there were still a handful, retired now I'd say.

    Yeah I've been trying to find out if there's any still knocking about. There doesn't seem to be any official "retirement" of them from schools.


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    #8
    un5byh7sqpd2x0
    Closed Accounts Posts: 1,862 ✭✭✭un5byh7sqpd2x0


    Did your principle not teach you about your principals?


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    #9
    Andrewf20
    Registered Users Posts: 3,187 ✭✭✭Andrewf20


    I had the last Christian brother in our school for 1 year. He retired in May 1993. Think he was in his 80s.


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    #10
    Gregor Samsa
    Registered Users Posts: 8,929 ✭✭✭Gregor Samsa


    In 2008, it was reported in the below article that there was less than 10 still teaching. At that point, they were handing over control of their schools to Edmund Rice Schools Trust, which is a lay organisation.

    https://www.independent.ie/irish-news/end-of-era-for-christian-brothers-26456484.html


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    #11
    pauliebdub
    Registered Users Posts: 1,061 ✭✭✭pauliebdub


    The six or seven who were teaching at the Christian brothers I went to in the 90's have all retired, I think only two are still alive.

    Most of them were actually sound.


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    #12
    cml387
    Registered Users Posts: 8,379 ✭✭✭cml387


    pauliebdub wrote: »
    The six or seven who were teaching at the Christian brothers I went to in the 90's have all retired, I think only two are still alive.

    Most of them were actually sound.

    Not what people want to hear.
    I went to CB school back in the 70's.
    The few Brothers left were excellent teachers and the leather was used sparingly and then not at all from 1972.


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    #13
    WestWicklow1
    Registered Users Posts: 1,194 ✭✭✭WestWicklow1


    Deleted User wrote: »
    I can't be too pacific, but I believe they are principally six feet under.

    You mean a fathom surely :rolleyes:


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    #14
    LuasSimon
    Closed Accounts Posts: 1,208 ✭✭✭LuasSimon


    The ones in my old school were excellent teachers and even better over sports teams , the WOKE crowd dont want to hear that though .


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    #15
    McGinniesta
    Registered Users Posts: 4,402 ✭✭✭McGinniesta


    Thankfully I got out of the education system in the 90's. Presumably the decline has continued although I wouldn't know for sure.


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    #16
    Edgware
    Registered Users Posts: 5,875 ✭✭✭Edgware


    cml387 wrote: »
    Not what people want to hear.
    I went to CB school back in the 70's.
    The few Brothers left were excellent teachers and the leather was used sparingly and then not at all from 1972.

    Of course there was serious failings with a number of Christian Brothers but many dedicated brothers provided excellent education to thousands of young men when no one else would. In the days before free secondary education they got lads to study hard, win scholarships etc. (In a time where corporal punishment was prevalent in home and school)
    Similar to nuns in the schools and hospitals.
    I know several nurses who trained in hospitals under the charge of nursing sisters and they have the highest respect for them. The specialists/ consultants would be of the same opinion. Its easy to tar them all with the same brush.


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    #17
    Carodh
    Registered Users Posts: 121 ✭✭Carodh


    sggleeson wrote: »
    Specifically principles, or have they long gone?

    There was one Christian Brother teaching 4 years ago in CBS Primary in Ennis. I’m
    Not 100% but I think he had been Principal previously.


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    #18
    Sardonicat
    Registered Users Posts: 12,378 ✭✭✭✭Sardonicat


    cml387 wrote: »
    Not what people want to hear.
    I went to CB school back in the 70's.
    The few Brothers left were excellent teachers and the leather was used sparingly and then not at all from 1972.

    Really, they stopped using it 10 years before they had to?


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    #19
    dodzy
    Registered Users Posts: 9,930 ✭✭✭dodzy


    cml387 wrote: »
    Not what people want to hear.
    I went to CB school back in the 70's.
    The few Brothers left were excellent teachers and the leather was used sparingly and then not at all from 1972.
    Vincents in Glasnevin took up the mantle....and ran with it for years after.


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    #20
    begbysback
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,910 ✭✭✭begbysback


    cml387 wrote: »
    Not what people want to hear.
    I went to CB school back in the 70's.
    The few Brothers left were excellent teachers and the leather was used sparingly and then not at all from 1972.

    lol, you say that with a straight face chief?


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    #21
    Hamachi
    Registered Users Posts: 2,419 ✭✭✭Hamachi


    LuasSimon wrote: »
    The ones in my old school were excellent teachers and even better over sports teams , the WOKE crowd dont want to hear that though .

    This matches my experience in a CBS. I did my leaving cert in 2000. Three of my subject teachers (Maths, Irish, and Geography) were brothers.

    All three were incredibly dedicated educators, in addition to investing a huge amount of their personal time into extra curriculars like sport and music.

    Their dedication is really evident in the success of many of my old classmates. A significant number are doctors, dentists, solicitors, and engineers. One guy is a CVP of one of the tech giants in Silicon Valley. All this from a regular CBS in the west.

    We owe the brothers an enormous debt of gratitude.


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    #22
    Gregor Samsa
    Registered Users Posts: 8,929 ✭✭✭Gregor Samsa


    Hamachi wrote: »
    This matches my experience in a CBS. I did my leaving cert in 2000. Three of my subject teachers (Maths, Irish, and Geography) were brothers.

    All three were incredibly dedicated educators, in addition to investing a huge amount of their personal time into extra curriculars like sport and music.

    Did my leaving in ‘91. Both my primary and secondary had CB principals, and I had a handful of CB teachers. Most were grand, some were very good, one should never have been allowed teach. However, I think the likes of you and I got the best era of them, when they were fading out.

    My experience of talking to relatives who went to full CB schools in the 40s, 50s, 60s is that they had it different. Some great teachers amongst them, but some absolute monsters too. The Christian Brothers weren’t forced to pay €30 million in redress to abuse victims in the early 2000s as a result of some “woke crowd” Twitter hashtag campaign, that’s for sure.


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    #23
    Sardonicat
    Registered Users Posts: 12,378 ✭✭✭✭Sardonicat


    Physical abuse of children was carried out by teachers across the board, not just religious. I'm a similar age to Gregor, and like that I had a mix of nuns and lau teachers. One or two lunatics who should never have been anywhere near children (nuns and non nuns), decent teachers who'd occasionally resort to a slap and teachers who would never harm a hair on your head. The boys in the local CBS schools, primary and secondary, had more experience of being beaten and this continued long after 1982. There was a tolerance for physical violence against boys that took a long while to be eradicated. Again, it wasn't all the teachers and it wasn't only brothers.


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    #24
    Grab All Association
    Registered Users Posts: 3,917 ✭✭✭Grab All Association


    There was a Brother Fitzgerald teaching in the CBS Thurles circa 2002, presume long since retired. Well liked by students iirc. The monastery house was recently sold to Thurles Lions Club and is used for social housing.


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    #25
    cml387
    Registered Users Posts: 8,379 ✭✭✭cml387


    Sardonicat wrote: »
    Really, they stopped using it 10 years before they had to?

    Yes.

    A new (CB) principle took over around that time and corporal punishment just disappeared. There was no "Big Announcement", it just faded away.


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    #26
    Hamachi
    Registered Users Posts: 2,419 ✭✭✭Hamachi


    Gregor Samsa wrote: »
    However, I think the likes of you and I got the best era of them, when they were fading out.

    My experience of talking to relatives who went to full CB schools in the 40s, 50s, 60s is that they had it different. Some great teachers amongst them, but some absolute monsters too.

    I’ve heard similar tales from my Dad and uncles, who attended the same school in the ‘70s. According to them, the brutality was meted out just as frequently by some of the lay teachers as it was by the brothers.

    Have no direct experience to relate. All I know for sure, is that I benefited from a very rigorous education that really set me up for the great life I enjoy today. I’m hugely thankful to them.

    I’m 38 and there were still significant numbers of brothers teaching when I did my leaving cert in 2000. I assumed that was standard in CBS’ across the country. However, reading this thread the consensus seems to be that the brothers had virtually withdrawn or retired from teaching by the early ‘90s. Was my school an anomaly?


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    #27
    Galwayguy35
    Registered Users Posts: 16,324 ✭✭✭✭Galwayguy35


    Wasn't taught by Christian Brothers but it wasn't just them who were handy with their fists, saw it with my own eyes when 3 lads in my class were thumped black and blue by teachers and they got away with it.

    Never the middle class kid that got walloped though.


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    #28
    Zaph
    Registered Users, Subscribers Posts: 47,282 ✭✭✭✭Zaph


    Went to a CB school, did my Leaving in 1984. At that time there were three brothers left - the principal, it was his first year there, had very limited dealings with him but he was a bit of a self-righteous asshole from what I saw. The second was a very strange little man who was probably the most gifted educator I've ever come across. He taught so many subjects, and he taught them all so well. Not a pupil in the school would ever have a bad word to say about him. The third was a complete and utter prick of the highest order. His teaching methods were from the 1950s, he completely destroyed my love for one of my favourite subjects, to the point that I failed it in my Leaving. He really had no business being there imo. There were also a couple of others who left while I was in the school. One who apparently, although I never witnessed it myself, took a gleefully sadistic pleasure when dishing out the leather (which was banned after my first year). And the old principal who, and I did unfortunately witness this myself many times, took an unhealthy interest in students showering after PE.


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    #29
    Dyr
    Registered Users Posts: 23,246 ✭✭✭✭Dyr


    Went to a CB school in the 80s that had many a former pupil in high society. all the brothers that were still around were mental, either psychos, pervs or just plain weirdos. The ordinary teachers werent much better, bullies and oddballs

    After a few years of that I refused to go anymore and was sent to the local national secondary school which had a tough reputation but the teachers were actually fine.


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    #30
    Gregor Samsa
    Registered Users Posts: 8,929 ✭✭✭Gregor Samsa


    Galwayguy35 wrote: »
    saw it with my own eyes when 3 lads in my class were thumped black and blue by teachers and they got away with it.

    Never the middle class kid that got walloped though.

    Certainly there were lay teachers that were animals. Had plenty of those myself. Maybe it depends on what your definition of “middle class” is (especially in the 80s) but they certainly didn’t take socioeconomic strata into account when beating children up or hanging them out a second storey window by the ankles in my school. Equal opportunity violence.

    But just remember, it wasn’t just the fact that it was sometimes CBs themselves dishing out the punches. It was the fact that it was the Christian Brothers that ran the schools, that were in charge, that created the atmosphere where teachers in their schools - religious or lay - could beat kids with impunity. It was institutional. That’s the crime.


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    #31
    ohnonotgmail
    Registered Users Posts: 40,184 ✭✭✭✭ohnonotgmail


    cml387 wrote: »
    Not what people want to hear.
    I went to CB school back in the 70's.
    The few Brothers left were excellent teachers and the leather was used sparingly and then not at all from 1972.

    1982 surely and they stopped because it was banned.


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