There are important questions to be asked about second-level education in the wake of the outcome from the Labour Court.
Reaction from the Government, parents' representatives and media commentators has shown teachers they are not perceived to be delivering something of strategic importance, nor is education valued.
One would have hoped that some at least could step back and realise that the fundamental issue is: will we continue to attract and retain highly motivated and able graduates unless salary structures are improved?
Deloitte and Touche, having investigated teachers' pay vis-a-vis other comparable professional groups, found a 30-40 per cent gap.
For parents the question now arises: if teachers were to accept the package, will education be as it was? There are some parents who regret that the word "terrorist" was used in such a calculated manner.
Does education create social and economic value for society? Will its strategic significance increase? Yes, on both counts, because we as a nation have pinned our colours to the mast of both the knowledge economy and the knowledge society.
The British Department of Education believed it could have teachers on the cheap and has been proved wrong.
We know there is not a benchmarking system in the world that can benchmark creativity and innovation, the key aspects of teaching. It has been tried and failed.
Can teachers afford to take the risk that benchmarking will bend its own rules to bridge the pay gap? Can it be expected to do so, when the benchmarking process is not exclusively for teachers but for the quarter-million public servants involved?
The Labour Court found that it could not accept that there are unique aspects to education. It did not see education providing something of strategic value. Can the benchmarking body ignore this?
The Labour Court clarifications, on very careful reading, give no real guarantees that the relative gap identified will be closed by benchmarking. Yet ASTI teachers are being asked to vote for a package before they know the final outcome.
Young teachers have already reacted: "I shall vote no and then I shall find another profession. I am not going to stay working in an area where I am valued so little and unappreciated. That is no way to live."
For teachers now the question arises: Will I do the extras I have always done for my students? Where is the teaching profession headed now that teachers know just how little they are valued and appreciated? The Government has apparently lied to every company it attracted to our shores on the back of the Irish education system. It knew the strategic value of education when it used Irish education to attract foreign investment by singing education's praises for many years: "worldclass education" (Taoiseach); "best in the world at meeting the needs of a competitive economy" (Enterprise Ireland).
Now it denies that there is anything unique in Irish education. The Government cannot have it both ways.
It saddens teachers to have to create conflict, having been brought to that pass by government in a Thatcherite cant of no, no, no.
Teachers are embarrassed and angry to find their value is put at a refund for expenses up to £350, with a once-off payment at around £850, after taxes. An industrial relations lecturer in UCD in the 1980s used to tell his students that when they saw a lump sum coming on the table they would know the union side was being cheated.
The issue of supervision and substitution is of urgency for management. Parents need to be aware that substitution can mask the lack of teachers. Teachers should not have to take on non-teaching duties to justify their income.
So what is the way forward? Are teachers "crushed"? No. It is now more important than ever that the message that education is of strategic value to this country is enunciated.
IF teachers vote yes, then as the ASTI general secretary has said, it is, truly, all over. And the effects of that will be felt within a very short period.
Teachers have much to gain by rejecting this offer and letting it be seen for what it is. The examinations for 2001 are not currently at risk. No one should feel that they have to vote in favour of the package to ensure that the exams are not hit.
ASTI members were given the PPF money by the Government because it did not wish to see a break in the common basic scale. The Labour Court has recommended that the ASTI take that money on account as part of the final settlement.
That is ASTI policy. Teachers can go back into the classroom and await the outcome of the benchmarking process, but in the meantime they are free to decide not to undertake any new work.
Government has made it clear it does not appreciate something given for nothing. Naively, teachers were willing to accept the often less-than-minimum standards both of surroundings and of pay to ensure that work got done for the good of students.
It has taken a rough five months for teachers to learn some lessons. One is that in today's Ireland you are more appreciated and valued when you put a price on your work.
Patricia Wroe is a member of ASTI's central executive council and a candidate in the forthcoming ASTI presidential election.