Life after the Leaving: ‘The results are not important in the grand scheme’

Declan Coyle is director of Andec Communications and a leadership and development consultant. A former Columban priest, he recently featured on the RTÉ documentary, The Judas Iscariot Lunch, about a group of former Columban missionaries who left the priesthood.

I went to secondary school in the Laurence Gilson School in Oldcastle, Co Meath. It was Protestant and Catholic, mixed sex and overseen by the parish priest and local Church of Ireland minister.

You were treated as an adult and there was a lovely caring atmosphere. There was no beating or physical punishment

I did my Leaving Certificate aged 16, joined the Columban Fathers when I was 17. Having studied to become a Columban father, I went to Ottawa, Canada, where I earned two master’s degrees before heading to work with some of the world’s poorest people.

I came out of university thinking I knew it all. Spending time with people in the slums of the Philippines made me realise I knew very little.

I worked in some of the poorest and most deprived slums in the world where people had been to the university of life and thrived, and it led me to change my way of thinking about the world.

In all my years of education I was never asked what my strengths or talents were. No teacher or professor sat me down and asked me how I could use my talents to better the world.

Our education system is problematic – if you speak to someone during class you’re scolded. For example, if you don’t speak to your colleagues in the corporate world and if you don’t collaborate and come up with creative solutions you’re in trouble. That way of educating people was designed for when people were sent off to work in a factory or a plant.

Young people need to ask themselves, what is their gift, their talent and their strength. How are you going to use that to better the services of humanity?

We have very powerful, hardworking middle managers all around the world, working hard trying to teach hens to swim. You have managers saying to the hen, we know you can lay eggs but you must improve your swimming.

Swimming is a duck’s job, laying eggs is a hen’s job, but the education system is gearing us to be taught how to swim as hens because the fundamental thing in education is missing.

The Leaving Cert and the results are not important in the grand scheme of things. People have to connect to their talent and purpose in life and do what makes their heart sing. Don’t be a frustrated carpenter doing surgery.

Áine McMahon