Half of secondary schools had to restrict student access to at least one subject due to teacher shortages last year, according to research published by the Teachers’ Union of Ireland (TUI).
A fifth of schools were forced to drop at least one subject entirely, the survey of just over 100 school principals across the country found.
They also reported continuing problems with recruitment and retention, with 75 per cent saying they had advertised at least one teaching vacancy during the previous six months for which they had received no applications.
Most principals (89 per cent) said they used second-year professional master of education students to cover gaps in their teaching rosters, and 59 per cent said they had ongoing vacancies they have been unable to fill.
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The survey, carried out by the TUI along with its affiliate organisation, the Principals and Deputy Principals Association (PDA), suggests Irish, maths and French are the three subjects for which schools most commonly struggle to recruit teachers.
Shortages are also reported in a wide range of other areas, including guidance counselling, Spanish, physical education and vocational subjects such as metalwork and woodwork.
Schools reported new hires pulling out of jobs in order to take up roles at other schools, with 55 per cent experiencing it after timetables had been put in place, resulting in significant disruption.
[ Teaching has become an increasingly lonely professionOpens in new window ]
Eighty-four per cent of respondents said they believed the Government should be doing more to support recruitment and 76 per cent felt measures should be taken to make it more attractive for young teachers working overseas to return to jobs in Ireland.
Crediting these teachers with their full length of service was one of the key changes mentioned.
“The continuing inaction of the Department [of Education] is absolutely startling,” said TUI president Anthony Quinn.
“It’s long been our belief that our policymakers have been happy to ride out the crisis until student demographics at second level change. This is an insult to the students currently in the system who are losing out in terms of subject options,” he said.
[ Hundreds of teaching posts remain unfilled amid ‘substitution crisis’, INTO warnsOpens in new window ]
PDA president Michael Murphy said: “We’re finding that the retention of teachers already in the system is often now as big a challenge as actual recruitment. These highly qualified graduates are extremely employable in a range of areas across the economy.
“We need to ensure that the profession is a sustainable one for them from the start,” he said, while repeating the organisation’s previous calls for the restoration of middle management posts cut during the recession.
Asked for comment, the Department of Education rejected the suggestion that the sector continues to be generally short staffed.
“The November 2025 data shows that just 0.7 per cent of allocations in post-primary are vacant, down from 3.6 per cent in November 2023,” it said.
“This relatively low vacancy rate suggests that the vast majority of schools are well-staffed and able to meet the needs of their students.”
