Towards a Better Future

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Chapter Twelve: Conclusion have been fraught with controversy, linked to industrial relations problems and to resentments of an imposed reign of austerity. Since at least the early 1990s, this issue has been regarded as a problem in the way of much-needed advances in Ireland’s schooling, but it remains to be satisfactorily resolved, if these delayed advances are to be made. The other major requisite which is missing is adequate budgetary resourcing to enable and to nurture these advances. While the promotion of education is a sectoral issue, in the sense that it is the immediate responsibility of the Department of Education and Skills, it is also a government issue in that it impinges on a very wide range of society’s concerns. In common with other public services, education suffered during the recession. However, over the past twenty years or so, education has lost out vis-à-vis the other main spending Departments where its share of the overall national budget is concerned. In a recent newspaper article, John Walshe pointed out that in 1950, spending on health, education and social welfare accounted for only a third of government spending. Today, these three departments account for almost 80% of government spending. However, in relative terms, health and social welfare have benefited significantly more than education has from this increase. Since the year 2000, all three increased their share for reasons such as demographics, rising costs etc. Nevertheless, while social welfare has increased from 26.7% to 38% of the overall national budget and health has increased from 19.6% to 26%, education has only increased from 13.9% to 17% over this period (Walshe, 2016). The findings and suggested policy paths arising from this review of our schooling indicate the unsustainability of this situation. The references to a New Deal in the preceding chapters are not rhetorical or tendentious. The state has in recent years endorsed a reform agenda for schooling with many commendable features, including advances in the induction procedures for newlyqualified teachers, self-evaluation by practitioners, and a more learner-focused curriculum at postprimary Junior Cycle. However, for all its merits, it is an agenda that has not ignited the wide-scale enthusiasm of Ireland’s teachers. More inclusive and more imaginative policy approaches are called for. A new vision is needed to redress structural shortcomings of some decades and inequities that have become more overt in a time of recession. Without such a vision, including the serious longterm commitment to increased educational expenditure needed to realise it, the chances of successful implementation of any agenda for improvement are seriously in jeopardy. To assist in the articulation and pursuit of such a vision, we have summarised below some key issues needing attention and action. For ease of reference, the issues are grouped under the headings of the eleven foregoing chapters. The remarks under each of the eleven headings are necessarily concise. They are not intended as a list of recommendations. Rather, they are designed to invite constructive, practical forms of engagement with ideas arising from a fuller reading of the chapters themselves. — 185 —
Towards a Better Future: A Review of the Irish School System 1. TEACHING AND LEARNING The more dominant conceptions of teaching and learning in the public arena – often even among teachers themselves – fail to do justice to the daily realities of educational practice. In particular, they have an inadequate understanding of learning. Any adequate understanding of teaching needs to overcome uncritical notions of transmission, and associated one-sided notions like ‘delivering the curriculum’ or ‘covering the course’. The prevalence of many variants of the transmission idea in the everyday workings of policy and practice places too much emphasis on so-called transfer of knowledge and skills. It places too little on the enduring attitudes to learning and practices of learning that take shape, beneficially or otherwise, in educational experience as it unfolds. Preoccupation with transmission, and with the examining of its results, hinders a professional requirement of first importance among practitioners of teaching. That is: the systematic perceptiveness called for in devising and promoting a high quality of educational experience among students. This perceptiveness is crucial in evaluating or validly assessing anything important in education, including the short-term and lasting consequences of the learning experiences that take place in our schools and colleges. Where it is embodied in the work of practitioners, such perceptiveness ensures a continuing focus on the monitoring and enhancement of students’ capabilities and genuine accomplishments. It also highlights the inadequacies of the omnipresent notion of ‘delivering’ a curriculum and of measuring the ‘outcomes’ of such delivery. These points are centrally relevant to the cultivation of a strong capacity for self-evaluation among teachers and schools. 2. EARLY CHILDHOOD EDUCATION In this chapter it was suggested that the percentage of GDP allocated to Early Childhood Education should be increased to 0.8%. More attention and support needs to be given to the education and training of staff for this area. Support needs to be sustained for the implementation of Aistear. The synchronisation of Aistear with the infant years in the primary school curriculum needs to be achieved. There should be a cap on the size of reception classes in primary schools. Continuing efforts are needed for the incorporation of children with disabilities in free pre-school provision. 3. CURRICULUM Chapter 3 outlined the history of curriculum policy in primary and second-level schools in Ireland and focused on current curriculum reform. It summarised the recent revision of the Primary Language Curriculum and the upcoming revision of Primary Maths. It traced the many efforts over the past forty years to reform Junior Cycle curriculum and welcomed the new Junior Cycle Framework,which was agreed between the teacher union leaders and the Minister in May 2015. The — 186 —
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